by Julia Sykes
Sofia
This whole situation was too bizarre. Cooking with Mateo was actually fun.
Before this morning, I’d rarely seen him smile. He’d always been aloof, mysterious, and broodingly gorgeous.
Now, he smiled whenever I teased him, a sexy, indulgent smile. Although he was clearly amused, there was something darker in his eyes when he looked at me like that. He didn’t appear angry or cruel. Maybe…hungry was a better word to describe it.
Whatever it was, it made me feel all hot and shivery at the same time. I’d never experienced anything like it before, but around Mateo, it seemed to happen often. The sensation was new and foreign, but I liked it a lot.
“Finish your eggs,” he commanded, tipping his chin in the direction of my mostly-empty plate.
“I’m full,” I replied. “I don’t usually eat this much for breakfast. I’m more of a mocha latte and pastry to-go kind of girl.”
“Two more bites.”
I smirked at him. “Are you really negotiating with me about two bites of eggs?”
His smile was a touch more twisted than my own. “It’s not a negotiation. Go on. You didn’t eat enough yesterday. You need more calories this morning.”
I rolled my eyes, but I took a single bite to placate him. When I set down my fork, he fixed me with a hard stare. He wasn’t smiling anymore, but his eyes were still glinting with the strange intensity that made my blood heat.
“Fine,” I scoffed, polishing off the eggs as though I was somehow challenging him with my flippancy. I let my fork clatter onto the empty plate. “Are you happy now?”
“Yes.” His mouth quirked up at the corners. “I’m very happy you did as you were told. Good girl.”
I attempted to huff in irritation, but I had to press my lips together to suppress my own smile. “Not this again,” I complained.
“What? You don’t like being my good girl?”
God, why did his voice have to sound like pure sex when he said those two words? They were all deep and slow and rumbly. I could practically feel them caress my skin as palpably as his big hands had stroked me when he’d held me this morning.
“I don’t like how bossy you are.” My accusation came out far too breathily, and I couldn’t look directly at him.
“I thought I warned you about lying to me,” he drawled.
Suddenly, his warm breath fanned across my neck, and his tone dropped lower as he leaned in close. “You do like when I’m bossy. And that makes me happy. Do you want to know why?”
“Why?” I whispered, an automatic response to his low prompting. I didn’t register that my eyes closed. My other senses were far too overwhelmed to compete. His scent surrounded me; his heat licked at my skin; his deep voice filled my mind like a warm, heavy fog.
“Because I like when you obey me, Sofia.” I could practically hear his dark smile. “I like it because I want to protect you, and I’ll issue commands with your best interests in mind. But sometimes…” He paused, and I felt his lips ghost over the shell of my ear. “Sometimes, I’ll order you to do things for my pleasure. You’ll want to obey just because you know it will please me. Because you do like being my good girl. And I promise you’ll be rewarded for your obedience.”
His forefinger touched my neck, brushing along the line of my artery. A needy little whimper eased up my throat.
He made a satisfied humming sound that I felt deep in my body, as though he’d plucked a bass string somewhere low in my belly.
A blaring ringtone jolted me out of the moment, and my eyes snapped open. Mateo’s heat withdrew from me, and he muttered a curse.
“I have to get this,” he told me, not waiting for me to respond before he answered the call. “Adrián,” he said into the receiver, suddenly clipped and business-like. “Yes, she’s fine.” His eyes remained fixed on me, even though I wasn’t actually included in the conversation. “I’m not sure yet. We’ll see.”
I frowned and crossed my arms over my chest. Mateo was talking to Adrián about me again, and I didn’t appreciate not being invited to voice my own opinion. I might not hate Mateo, but I also wasn’t thrilled about this arrangement. Being with him was better than being imprisoned in my childhood home, but it still wasn’t what I would have chosen.
It didn’t seem that anyone actually cared about my choices.
While I’d been having fun with Mateo over breakfast, I’d managed to forget my anguish at utterly losing control over my own life. It was easier to allow myself to be distracted by him than to dwell on my awful new reality. I’d struggled with control issues in the past, and I’d worked hard to overcome my negative coping mechanisms.
Finding out that my father was a drug lord and being held hostage by my long-time crush was a hell of a lot more to deal with than my mom trying to dictate my teenage hairstyle.
I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly, purposefully releasing the tension that was beginning to build in my chest. The last thing I needed right now was to fall back into old, addictive habits that I’d kicked years ago.
“Yes, boss,” Mateo said. “I’ll keep you updated.”
He ended the call and slipped his phone back into his pocket, only to withdraw my own rose gold phone a second later.
Automatically, I reached for it. He pulled back slightly and fixed me with a warning frown.
“Oh, come on,” I complained. “You’re seriously not going to give me my freaking phone?”
“I don’t know what you might do if I give you access to call for help,” Mateo countered. “So for now, I am the only one who handles your phone.”
I threw up my hands, exasperated. “I’m not exactly being a difficult prisoner here,” I pointed out. “I’m not fighting you or trying to run away. We just made scrambled eggs together, for god’s sake. Believe me, I don’t want to go home and see my dad anytime soon.”
He studied me for a long moment, his eyes scanning my face as though he could look right into my thoughts and read my sincerity.
“All right,” he allowed. “If that’s true, then this won’t be a problem. Tell me which of your friends I should text so they don’t worry about why you’re not in class. And I’ll need the names of your professors, so I can email them to make an excuse for you.”
“But you don’t have to do that,” I insisted. “You said I could go back to my classes if I behaved. I’m not fighting you.”
His head canted to the side, considering. “I said you might be able to go back to your classes, once I can trust you to obey me, no matter what.”
“Ugh, enough with all this obedience bullshit,” I insisted hotly. “You know what? No. I’m not going to tell you who to text and email.”
“No?” I heard the danger in his soft tone, but I ignored it. I was too righteously pissed off.
“That’s right: no. If you’re so worried that people at UCLA might notice my absence and get concerned about where I am, then I’m not going to help you resolve this little issue. But you could just make this easier on both of us and let me attend my classes. I won’t go to my dad’s house, and I won’t go to my apartment, either.” I remembered Mateo’s bleak warning of what might happen if I went back to my apartment. I couldn’t bear the thought of being forcibly dragged back to Daddy.
“I’ll just go to class, and I’ll come right back here after,” I continued. “I promise.”
His black eyes narrowed. “You think this is a negotiation?”
“I think it’s a compromise,” I countered.
“Well, you’re wrong,” he said bluntly. “In my house, there are no compromises and definitely no negotiations. You do as I say, or you face consequences.”
“Consequences.” I made sure to put the word in air quotes. “Yeah, you mentioned them last night. Like what? What are you going to do if I don’t help you hold me hostage?”
His eyes sparked. “Punish you.”
My mouth went dry, and my little tirade ended abruptly. “Wait. What?”
“You hear
d me.”
“But…” I licked my lips, struggling to weigh up my options. “But what does that mean, exactly?”
His brows rose. “Keep testing me, and you’ll find out.”
“You said I could go back to my classes when you know you can trust me.” I tried to change tactics. “You can trust me now. I promise I won’t try to run away from you or get help from anyone.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know that with one hundred percent certainty. Not yet. I’m sure you think you’re being sincere right now, but you could change your mind once you’re out in public. I won’t let you leave this house until I know you’ll do whatever I say without question.”
“That’s not fair,” I argued. “I’m telling you the truth, and you don’t want to believe me. I shouldn’t be confined to your house just because you have trust issues.”
“And I suppose you think I should be more like you and trust everyone?” he shot back. “You don’t live in that world anymore, Sofia. Your pretty little life was a lie. Most people aren’t good. They aren’t kind. I would be a fool to blindly trust everyone I meet.”
His barbed comments cut to my core. I was still trying to avoid thinking about how my cushy, safe reality had been cruelly shattered. I was fully aware that I’d been foolish and perhaps even willfully ignorant to believe Daddy’s lies, so I could keep living in my normal little bubble.
And I’d definitely been acting like an idiot to enjoy cooking breakfast with Mateo, my unbending jailor.
“You’re right,” I seethed. “I have been foolish. I was stupid to think I could ever trust you. But you aren’t good. You aren’t kind. You’re a criminal. Just like Adrián. Just like my dad. You think I’m going to help a criminal keep me captive? You think I’m going to be a compliant little hostage? Fuck you, Mateo.”
His face turned stonier with each accusation I hurled at him. When I spat my final insult, he remained silent for several of my racing heartbeats.
“Go to your room,” he ground out.
“Excuse me?” I choked. He couldn’t be serious.
“I warned you before: if you act like a brat, you get treated like a brat. Now, go to your room.” He enunciated each word.
A crazed laugh burst from my chest, booming through the kitchen. This was all too insane. He honestly thought he could put me in time-out like a naughty child?
I had one second to note the hard resolve that turned his features to granite before my world turned upside down.
“Hey!” I exclaimed, shocked to find myself slung over his shoulder. “What are you doing?”
His fingers bit into my thigh, silencing me as effectively as a palm against my mouth.
Oh, god. His big hand was braced right beneath my ass. The thin cotton barrier of his t-shirt did little to protect my vulnerable flesh from his iron hold. The heat of his hand branded me, and I became very aware of the fact that he was only an inch away from touching my sex.
I went limp against him, too overwhelmed to consider struggling. Not that I would have any chance against his strength, anyway.
Had I thought that being sent to my room seemed childish and silly only moments ago?
Mateo definitely wasn’t joking around. And I’d never been more aware of the womanly parts of my body. Something pulsed between my legs, and my nipples pebbled.
He made that low, growly noise again.
I nearly moaned in mortification. Did he somehow know what was happening to me?
I shouldn’t feel turned on right now. Being carried off by big, sexy Mateo had been a particularly favorite fantasy of mine for several years, but not like this. Not when he was holding me against my will and punishing me for refusing to obey him.
The world spun again, and my feet touched soft carpet. Mateo’s hands remained on my hips just long enough to steady me before he pulled away.
He stared down at me, and I suddenly felt very small in his huge shadow.
“You’re going to stay in here and think about your behavior,” he ground out. His muscles bulged and flexed, as though he was physically restraining himself from doing more to me. “You get to come out when you agree to cooperate. For now, I’ll answer any texts or emails as they come through to your phone. But until you decide to be good for me, you’re not leaving this room.”
He turned toward the door.
“Wait, you’re not staying in here with me?” God, why did I have to sound so pathetic?
The idea of being sent to my room had seemed preposterous, but now that it was actually happening, I found that I didn’t like it at all. As an extrovert, I didn’t enjoy much alone-time in general, and enforced isolation was a painful trigger point for me. Daddy used to confine me to my room when I’d disappointed him. The withdrawal of affection was more devastating than if he’d belted me for bad behavior.
Being left alone with my thoughts the day after my entire world had crumbled would be awful.
“No, I’m not staying,” Mateo said, his eyes softening slightly in response to my flash of distress.
“But I don’t want to be in here by myself.”
One corner of his lips quirked in a small smile, but he seemed more regretful that amused. “That’s how punishments work, belleza.”
For a moment, he lingered, and I thought he might change his mind. Then, he walked away and shut the door behind him. I heard the lock click into place.
It seemed Mateo had been completely serious when he’d warned me that there would be consequences for disobedience.
I realized I was hugging my arms around my chest, and I quickly dropped them to my sides. Just because Mateo was choosing to treat me like a naughty child didn’t mean I had to act like one.
There was a TV in the room, for god’s sake. It wasn’t like I was locked in a dark dungeon.
If Mateo thought I’d cave to his demands just because I had no choice but to watch TV all day, he was mistaken. Plenty of people binge watched TV. I didn’t often make a habit of it, but it wasn’t as though it would be a hardship.
I found the remote and settled back onto the bed, arranging the pillows in a comfortable pile.
If Mateo didn’t trust me when I promised him that I could go to my classes but not try to run away from him, then that was his problem. I wouldn’t just roll over and help him keep me away from school. My knowledge of who to contact in order to avoid an emergency alert being sent out for me was my only tiny bit of leverage in this situation.
This is going to be easy, I told myself as I tuned in to HGTV.
It wasn’t easy.
It was every bit as awful as I’d feared.
There were only so many different shows I could watch about home renovation before they all started blending into one another, but I managed to keep myself distracted for the first few hours. I barely even thought about the heavy weight of guilt pressing down on my heart.
On a rational level, I knew feeling guilty was completely unwarranted in this situation. I hadn’t done anything wrong. Mateo was the one committing a crime against me. I was just standing up to him and advocating for myself.
But the emotional response to this kind of punishment was too deeply ingrained in my psyche. Daddy had isolated me like this when I failed at something important.
If I was rude or even insensitive toward an important guest: Go to your room.
If I didn’t get an A on a test: Go to your room.
I’d even been punished like this when I was in kindergarten and didn’t get a gold star for playing well with others.
I hated the crushing guilt associated with disappointing the only parent who showed me any affection. It wasn’t as though Mom cared enough to comfort me or offer reassurance.
By the time Mateo brought me a sandwich for lunch, it was all I could do to not apologize like a desperate little girl to try to win back his approval.
But the only thing I hated more than being isolated was losing control over my choices. When I was younger, Mom had kept me on a strict regimen to
enhance my physical appearance, controlling everything from my hairstyle to the clothes I was allowed to wear. Having a pretty daughter reflected well on her, and her standards were exacting.
The guilt of disappointing Daddy was awful, but being deprived of my autonomy had broken me once before.
I would never let that happen again.
But the day in isolation went by painfully slowly. Mateo’s lunchtime check-in had been ages ago. The sun was beginning to set behind the trees that lined what I assumed was his back lawn. I didn’t really have an understanding of the layout of his house and property, but the swath of green grass visible outside my window was obviously a lawn. The turf ended at a thick tree line, and I couldn’t see anything beyond that.
I thought I was still somewhere near LA, but I had no idea which neighborhood I was in, and I didn’t have any means to get my bearings.
It didn’t really matter where I was located, anyway. I might as well have been on the moon for all the difference it would make.
There was nowhere for me to go if I left Mateo’s house. Not really.
I refused to go back to my childhood home and face Daddy. But according to Mateo, returning to my apartment wasn’t an option, either. If I went there, I might as well just drive straight to Daddy and save myself from being forcibly abducted again.
Where else was I going to go?
I supposed I could crash with one of my friends, but I didn’t want to bring this shitstorm into any of their lives. If Daddy was ruthless enough to hurt Valentina in exchange for power, what might he do to my friends if he wanted me to come home, and they stood in his way?
Going on the run was an option, but not one that appealed to me. I didn’t want to abandon everyone and everything I knew. Even if the remnants of the life I was cleaving to had always been a lie, I didn’t want to leave them.
Everything was spiraling out of my control.
I pressed my palms against my closed eyes, as though I could stop my cyclical thoughts if I applied enough pressure.
I inhaled deeply, practicing the breathing exercises I’d learned in therapy. They’d served me well over the last five years, and I hadn’t had a single incident since I was fifteen.
