The easy answer to Phantom’s question was that simply murdering Dawn would’ve been too light a punishment. The harder and truer answer was that if Victor were capable of killing Dawn, he would have done so already.
He had no good excuse to give for this weakness. And he doubted his cousin would have excepted his best answer: She’s an open wound that I’m trying to heal. You don’t put bullets in open wounds.
“She’ll be out soon,” Victor assured Phantom without replying to other questions.
“You sure about that?” Phantom asked when another few minutes passed without any sign of her at the town hall’s double glass doors.
No, Victor wasn’t sure about that. Why hadn’t she arrived yet? Had she made a run for it, escaped through a bathroom window like in so many American movies? No. Where was there for her to go? Surely, she had guessed after waking up in the back of his car that wherever she went, wherever she tried to hide, he would hunt her down.
But then, Phantom introduced a possibility Victor hadn’t considered. “Let me tell you, these American chicks are real fucking fragile. Sure you don’t want me to go in there? Make sure she didn’t slice her wrists in the toilet or something?”
The thought of her doing that to escape made Victor’s throat burn. But he still carried his father’s voice in his head.
Show no weakness. He didn’t allow Phantom to go in after her. Victor held the course, and another two minutes passed. Phantom didn’t say anything else. But Victor could almost hear what his cousin was thinking as they watched the door.
That he was an idiot. That this whole plan was idiotic. That if Dawn had run away or offed herself, it would be what Victor deserved for being the idiot who had come up with the idiot plan.
Just when Victor didn’t think he could take it anymore, Dawn pushed through the town hall’s front entrance.
The sight of her hit him even harder than when Phantom first dumped her in the Bentley’s back seat.
He’d very rarely seen her out of her school uniform back in Japan. But now she was wearing a college t-shirt with a pair of cotton sports shorts. The outfit showed off all of her curves, hugging her hips and her large breasts. Meanwhile, the waist-length black braids she wore her hair in now swayed as she came bouncing down the stairs.
It was like watching a slo-mo reintroduction to the grown woman who’d replaced the girl he’d once known. And his body responded the same as it would have when he’d been a schoolboy. His cock stirred, and the kind of need he hadn’t felt in years—hot and urgent—suddenly flooded his body.
A memory floated back to him. Dawn sitting on his lap as they made out, and him having to shift her away from his instantaneous erection because he didn’t want to scare her with how fucking hard she made him.
He hated that his body still responded to her like this. Hated that she could make him feel anything when all the other women he had taken since her only made him feel numb.
“What took you so long?” Phantom demanded as she approached the car.
She looked directly at Victor as she answered his cousin’s question. “I had to use the bathroom—like, really had to use it. I’m not sure how long ago you two kidnapped me, but I’m figuring it’s been hours. And before that, the judge held me back for a little conversation. Pretty sure he thought you were trafficking me like dear old dad.”
Rage spiked inside of him that she would dare bring up his dead father. Also, they didn’t traffic women anymore. Han had insisted on cutting girls out of their product offerings when Victor asked him to help him create The Silent Triad. And they’d already let Kuang know that this was the one part of his business they refused to touch. But he didn’t want to give Dawn the satisfaction of telling her that.
And apparently, neither did Phantom.
“Congratulations, Mrs. Zhang,” he said with a mocking tone as he opened the back door. “Hope you had a nice shit.”
“I did. Thanks for asking, Phan-Phan!” she answered, her tone ten times as mocking. “And congratulations to you, too. I just thought you were a little off when you broke into a high school to threaten three underaged boys. But you’ve really upped your psycho with this kidnapping stuff.”
For once, Phantom didn’t have a smart comeback. And even if he had, she slipped into the car before she could receive his retort.
Something visible ticked in Phantom’s jaw as he asked Victor through clenched teeth, “You sure about this, man?”
No. No, Victor wasn’t sure at all.
She had changed, Victor noted. Gone was the girl who could barely look him in the eye. The sweet teenager who had always tried to be kind to his glowering cousin despite Phantom’s enmity was nowhere to be found.
That girl had been an illusion, Victor reminded himself. She had been playing him all along. He couldn’t let himself forget that he decided as he climbed into the car.
No matter how hard she made his cock.
Ten years. Ten years for her to rot, the same as his father would have if he had lived.
Ten years for him to inure himself to her. His only weakness.
He’d leave Dawn her family at the end of the sentence as he’d promised. But by the time he was done with her, family would no longer matter. He planned to break her, to destroy her mind and soul. The girl who played him for a fool would never hurt him again.
And then, he would finally be free. This, he assured himself as they drove away from the town hall.
4
DAWN
“Are you taking me back to New York now?” I asked as soon as Victor got into the car.
We’re married. Married! But he still sat across from me as an adversary. Not beside me like he used to insist on when we were in Japan.
“No,” he answered. Man, he loved that sign to death these days.
“Then where are you taking me?”
He didn’t answer.
And just in case you were wondering…no, getting the silent treatment from someone who can’t talk didn’t feel any less irritating.
“I have to report in for an internship in New York on Monday,” I pointed out. “It’s a little clinic, and they need me there.”
He began to sign before the words were entirely out of my mouth. “Actually, you’ve already been replaced.”
My stomach iced over at his answer. “What do you mean?”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a device shaped like a rectangle.
My eyes widened because it looked like the iPhone 3GS that Steve Jobs had just announced at a special conference. But it couldn’t be. They weren’t even out yet.
Yet, here Victor was, extending a phone that looked exactly like the one showcased in the latest “Stevenote” to me.
I took it. Partly out of shock. Partly out of curiosity. “Is this an iPhone 3GS?” I asked. “But how did you get this? I thought they weren’t coming out until June.”
“Check your email,” he signed as if he didn’t hear any of my other questions.
I did as he said. I’d never had a smartphone. They’d come out the summer after my sophomore year of college, and I was barely keeping up with the annual tuition raises at Mount Holyoke, so no fancy iPhone for me. But all the hype I heard about it had been correct. It was ridiculously easy to navigate, and I instantly found the envelope icon.
I pressed it, wondering whether I’d have to use some kind of syncing process to get to my Yahoo account. Nope. Both my school and Yahoo accounts immediately popped up on the front screen. And the Yahoo account had a 1 beside it, which I assumed meant I had a new message.
I clicked on the mailbox, and my heart dropped into my stomach when I saw the sender. Dr. Olivia Glendaver. She was the assistant director at the Women’s Disability Clinic, the small medical center where I was supposed to start interning next week.
The subject line didn’t bode well. Re: dropping out of the internship
I pressed on the message anyway.
“Dear Dawn…” I read out loud. “Thank
you for letting us know you wouldn’t be joining us for the summer internship. Though your message was brief and received only three days before you were due to start, I’ll assume this must have been a hard decision for you to make. Fortunately, we have a long waiting list for this incredibly prestigious internship, and I’ve already filled your spot. Best of luck with your future endeavors. Dr. Olivia Glendaver.”
I dropped my gaze to the original message below her polite but obviously-pissed-off reply. It simply read, “I changed my mind about taking the internship. Replace me with someone else.”
“Oh my God, this message is so rude!” I looked up at Victor in complete disbelief. “I can’t believe you got someone to hack into my account to send it. Why would you do this?”
Victor’s eyes glittered, ferocious and cold as he answered, “I am your owner now. And I don’t have any desire to see you live out your father’s dream. You will stay here in Rhode Island in the place I’ve set up for you with monthly money.”
I could only assume “monthly money” meant some kind of stipend or allowance.
“Doing what?” I asked.
“Waiting,” he replied. “For your owner to return.”
Strangely that answer made me even more furious than the email he’d sent. “I don’t want to sit around doing nothing!”
A hard moment passed between us. Then he signed, “Do you truly believe I care about what you want?”
No… I guess he didn’t. Not anymore. I’d been holding it together before, but panic started to close in on me, like a night shadow the sun couldn’t hold back.
“Answer me,” he signed. “Answer your owner.”
I did, but I couldn’t bring myself to talk, to say it out loud.
“No,” I answered, my sign short and to the point.
“No,” he confirmed.
Only a few moments later, we pulled up to a house set far back from the street, with a high wall of evergreen shrubbery standing in front of it. A section of the natural green wall had been carved out for a rust-red gate. When we pulled up to it, it buzzed and slid open to give the car access to the long driveway hidden behind it.
This was where I would be living for the next ten years. I peered out the window at a bright yellow two-story colonial with black shutters and large windows. A short row of brick steps led to a huge front porch with white stone columns holding up the front. And two gorgeous flowering bushes were flanking the steps.
My prison was beautiful. Like something straight out of Suburban Dreams magazine.
I was trying to keep it together. I was trying not to let the panic win. But this made it real.
I’d spent four years of my life getting that diploma. I’d made plans to become a doctor and finally make my parents proud.
Med school, residency, possible fellowship. That was where I was supposed to be, what I was supposed to be doing for the next ten years. Thirty-two had always seemed like the year when I’d have to get serious about having kids. But my internship wasn’t going to happen. Or med school at Manhattan University….
All those plans. All my parents’ dreams….
Panic squeezed it’s cold fingers around my heart, threatening to collapse my mind.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked Victor again, turning back to face him in the car. “Why don’t you just kill me?”
I expected him to ignore this question, just like he had so many of my other ones. But his hands immediately started moving.
“I want you to hurt. I want you to suffer. I want to humiliate you the way your father did me. I want you to lose everything.”
Well, I asked the question, and that was an answer. Not an answer I liked, though.
I wanted to tell him that I didn’t have anything to do with what happened that day. But he’d already told me the consequences for even attempting that again. And why would he believe me anyway? My father had done such a good job of selling the story he’d completely made up.
Besides, who would I be telling?
The only person I wanted forgiveness from was the boy I fell in love with four years ago. But Victor had made it more than obvious. That boy was gone. And the only person left was the monster sitting across from me.
Once again, he got out of the car, expecting me to follow.
Okay, forget him and forget all these games he’s trying to play with my head. He owned me now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he hadn’t given me any orders. He hadn’t said explicitly that I had to walk myself into his beautiful prison.
I ignored the open door and made myself real comfortable in the back seat. This car was so lux. I could see myself staying there for a long, irritating time, especially now that I had a new iPhone.
The partition between the front and back seat came down when I reached for it, though.
“You can make me come back there and pull you out of that back seat if you wanna,” Phantom said without even bothering to look over his shoulder. “But I can’t guarantee you won’t get hurt if I do. That was my uncle you sent to jail.”
“Your uncle who deserved to go to jail,” I pointed out. “But I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Fuck you,” he answered. “Get the hell out of this car or else.”
I thought about calling his bluff. But nothing from my previous interactions with Phantom made me think he had a bluff to call when making threats.
I got out of the car but made sure to be real huffy about it as I did.
However, I slowed outside the door Victor had left slightly ajar.
What would happen in there?
The answer unspooled in my head like a movie.
He’d order me around in there too. It would be just like the Bentley ride. Him gleefully manipulating me and me struggling to catch up.
But I wasn’t the girl I used to be, a silly doormat overwhelmed by his sheer power. I had to endure some of his BS to keep my family safe. But I didn’t have to put up with all of it. I could take back some control….
5
With a steadying breath, I pushed open the door and walked into what turned out to be a front hall with a living room to the left and a dining room to the right.
Victor was waiting near the set of dark wood stairs that led up to the second floor. It was quite the dichotomy. A raven had landed inside the Suburban Dreams layout.
He raised his hands as soon as I came in, but I didn’t give him a chance to talk.
“So are we doing this or what?” I asked.
He stopped. Frowned. Then signed, “Doing what?”
It was all I could do not to let out a triumphant whoop. For once, it was him struggling to keep up.
“Sex,” I answered. I wasn’t signing, but I also wasn’t Dawn “never seen a dick in her life” Kingston anymore. I met his eyes boldly to add, “Your father was a monster, and now you’re a monster. So I figured sex would be part of the deal.”
His face went stony, and I crooked my head. “Oh, I’m sorry. Did I mess up your plan to revenge fuck me without consent? I figured if it would make you feel better about things, yeah, okay, why not? It’s been a while, and I could use the distraction after getting kidnapped-married after graduation. If you want, I can go back outside and roleplay like I’m super scared and overwhelmed.”
Of course, I wasn’t nearly as confident as I sounded. I wasn’t Dawn “never seen a dick in her life” anymore. But I also wasn’t Dawn “knows how to stand up to a beautiful gangster bent on revenge.” More like Dawn “I hope I don’t throw up while faking like I’m tough stuff,” which admittedly only sounds slightly cooler than Dawn “never seen a dick.”
But whatever. I hit a nerve.
If looks were knives, I’m sure the one Victor gave me would have sliced me open.
Then he said, “Go straight to the bedroom at the end of the hall. Take off your clothes. I will meet you there. Do not lie down.”
My stomach dropped. Oh, wow, this was really happening. Typical Dawn. I hadn’t thought beyond the part where I reversed our po
wer dynamic the best I could.
Seeing my hesitation, Victor’s eyes flashed with malicious triumph.
Okay, nope. I refused to let this domineering bastard bask in my fear. Self-doubt be gone.
I smirked and gave my shoulders a big-ass shrug. “Alright. I’ll meet you upstairs.”
I didn’t wait for him to respond. Just strutted up the stairs, following his instructions. But on my terms.
I easily found the room he mentioned. It was the only one with an open door. Obviously a master, it was almost as large as the suite at Victor’s apartment in Japan. So big, I had a feeling they’d paid a contractor to knock out a wall or something to fit the large bed and mini-living room, complete with a couch and a winged back chair, which sat next to a brick fireplace framed in elegant white plaster.
This room also looked like it could easily win a feature in that Suburban Dreams mag, except for one thing. A mirror covered one entire wall. What the hell?
Usually, I’m not a huge fan of getting naked in front of mirrors. There seemed to be a law that every dressing room on the globe had to feature harsh overhead beams that highlighted every fat dimple, stretchmark, and wobbly line of cellulite.
But the light in this room was good. Soft and flattering. I stripped off my clothes and left them in a pile on the floor.
Then I waited. And waited. And waited some more.
Old thought patterns from high school began to swirl around my head. Maybe he no longer wanted me that way. Maybe the curves I’d learned to flaunt over the last four years turned him off. Maybe he’d only sent me up here to play more of his fucked up mind games, and he wasn’t even planning to join me? Plus, I was getting cold…
I was thinking of putting back on some clothes and going downstairs to see if he was still there when he appeared behind me in the mirror. Like a ghost. Or a vampire.
A completely naked ghost or vampire.
My breath caught. I’d been right about his sharper cheek bones not meaning he’d lost weight. If anything, he packed on a few more pounds of muscle and was even more cut. A tattoo of a dragon with red diamond eyes covered his entire chest. It’s tail extended down his right arm, blending with several other tats to form a sleeve. His left arm remained bare, but I’d bet money that his back was covered in ink too. It made me want to go to him, turn him around and get a good look at all his excellent new artwork.
Victor: Her Ruthless Owner: The VICTOR Trilogy Book 2 [50 Loving States, Rhode Island] (Ruthless Triad) Page 2
