Captive

by Trevion Burns

  This time, it was Mia who came to her toes, pulling his lips down to hers, suckling the bottom one between hers, then the top.

  “I love you,” he whispered between each brush of their lips—each sweep of their tongues. Each beat of his aching heart. “I love you. I love you. I love you.”

  “I love you too, Linc.”

  And with those words petering into his ears, filling his heart, and slowing it to a normal beat—a beat that made it possible to breathe normally once more—Linc knew he was ready. He was ready to love and be loved in return. He was ready to give her everything he had, and more, wherever he could find it. He was ready to give Emma the mother she deserved and to surrender to the love he knew he deserved too. The love they all deserved.

  Most importantly of all, he was ready to take the woman he loved off that miserable ship…

  And burn it to the ground.

  38

  One Month Later

  Linc had burned the yacht to the ground, or rather, into the water, where the flaming vessel had eventually said its final goodbyes before plunging beneath the surface of the River Thames—to much fanfare and commotion. Every fire engine, police car, and news station in London had raced to the edge of Manchester Road where the view of the sinking boat had been the best. The media fuss and fire engine water cannons had come too late to save the doomed vessel, however, and the River Thames had swallowed it whole with London’s beloved Prince Ali onboard, along with his entire security team.

  Malik Ali had been pronounced dead just a few days later.

  After a few weeks, his beloved wife, Mia Ali, was announced as presumed dead. A presumption that had sent real shockwaves ebbing not just all over London, but all over the world, as news of the yacht tragedy spread like wildfire. It hadn’t taken long for conspiracy theorists to grab hold of the story, convinced that an obviously abusive Malik Ali had snapped, concocting and carrying out an elaborate murder-suicide scheme to punish his beautiful wife. Some of them had even come to the—correct—conclusion, that Mia was still alive since her body had never been recovered. It was a theory that had inspired countless people claiming to have “spotted” Mia all over the globe. The same way people still “spotted” Elvis and Tupac.

  But no one would spot Mia where they’d gone. On that small island off South Africa where everyone kept to themselves. No one would spot Mia with the nose job she’d followed through on getting like she’d told Linc she would, using the money her security guard friend had helped her hide away for all those years. No one would spot Mia Ali… because she was now living as Dominique White.

  In the wake of Malik and Mia’s death, the conspiracy-theory-loving public had turned on Malik in a flash, proving that his marriage to Mia had always been the real lifeblood of his political success. The key to his election to mayor.

  It was a fact Linc had always known, which was why he’d chosen her. Little had he known, all that time ago, that the night he’d snatched Mia from that gala in London, he’d been choosing her in more ways than one.

  “Where are we going?” Mia cried from the passenger seat of the truck. Her smiling lips proving that her faux-frustration was half-hearted at best. Her hands roamed aimlessly as the blindfold wrapped around her head and shielding her eyes left her almost incapacitated.

  Linc’s smiling eyes shone across the truck as he turned the steering wheel to the right, guiding the vehicle to their final destination.

  “It’s a surprise, Mia!” Emma cried from the backseat, the stuffed yellow bear lying face down in her lap and the last edition of the Harry Potter series, The Deathly Hallows, dog-eared on the seat next to her.

  Linc licked his lips and looked over his shoulder at Emma as he put the car in park. The moment their gazes met, Emma rolled her eyes playfully with a shake of her head that made the high ponytail, which Mia had tied her curls in earlier that morning, dance. Then Emma drew in a heaving breath before exhaling dramatically, as if she was utterly exhausted at how badly Mia was at sitting back and accepting surprises.

  “I hate surprises!” Mia screamed, confirming the silent look Linc and Emma were sharing as he pulled the keys from the ignition.

  “A’ight, a’ight, we’re here,” he grumbled, throwing open the driver’s side door. “Jesus Christ…”

  Unmoved by his playfully judgmental tone, Mia bobbed up and down in her seat as Emma and Linc both hopped out of the truck. Seconds later, the sound of the passenger door opening drew a squeal from her smiling lips, which inspired amused laughs from both Emma and Linc. The sound filled Mia’s ears and warmed her heart.

  But not nearly as much as the feeling of Linc’s callused hands on hers. She wondered if there would ever be a day when his touch didn’t send shockwaves zapping through her body as his other hand warmed her upper thigh, just below the hem of her white sundress, and guided her legs out of the car.

  “Jump down.” His deep voice filled her ears. “I’ve got you, baby.”

  Mia jumped down from the seat, frowning when the bottoms of her sandals hit something hard and crunchy. Asphalt? Concrete?

  “The ear buds, Daddy!” Emma’s high-pitched voice floated up followed by the crunch of her own sandals as she hopped up and down. “We forgot the ear buds!”

  “Oh, shit,” Linc grumbled, realizing Emma was right and also, apparently, realizing that Emma was six, quickly correcting himself. “I mean shoot.”

  A silence fell in, and even though she was blindfolded, Mia could almost see the mischievous grin on Emma’s face.

  Linc responded to the grin Mia saw in her head. “You’re not allowed to say that word, a’ight?”

  “But you say it all the time, Daddy.”

  “Yeah, well—” The rest of Linc’s words were cut off when, suddenly, Mia’s ears were filled with a foamy substance that she could only assume were the ear buds Emma had just finished hollering about.

  Then, silence.

  Nothing but the dull hum of her plugged ears and the peaceful thump of her heart. That peaceful thump was short-lived, however, when the ground suddenly fell out from under her, and the innate, human fear of falling out of control encased her bones. It was only after she realized she wasn’t falling, but instead, had been swept off her feet, cradled in the strongest pair of arms she’d ever have the pleasure of being swept up in, that her heart calmed down. The smile on her face spread wider. Wider still, when the warmth of his lips was on hers, his soapy scent swooping in. Her stomach bottomed out a little when she felt him bend down with her in his arms, and the softness of a smaller pair of lips was on her cheek too. The scent of the Johnson’s kid’s shampoo she’d massaged into a head of blonde curls earlier that morning filled her nose as well.

  After Emma’s sweet kiss, Mia couldn’t help but wonder that perhaps the sympathy she’d once felt for blind people might’ve been a little unfounded. If not for that moment, she’d have never fully understood the power of a soapy scent, of a soft kiss on the cheek, and of the flutter of blonde curls against her skin. She’d have never fully realized the power of all her other senses. The difference between the feeling of being carried across a hard surface and being carried across an uneven one. The feeling of Linc’s breath coming heavier, harder, from where his nose was tucked in her hair, as the ground, for whatever reason, suddenly got more difficult for him to walk on. The hardening of his biceps under her body as he gave all his strength to moving her to wherever he wanted her to be.

  To wherever her surprise was.

  If Mia hadn’t had that blindfold on, she wondered if the euphoria that washed over her when Linc finally came to a stop and set her to her feet would’ve been as strong as it was at that moment. If the millions of tiny beads that instantly trickled into her sandals and got caked between her toes would’ve stolen her breath the same way it did right then. If the cool shock of moisture that immediately followed suit, wetting the beads and solidifying them between her toes would’ve made the tears sting her still-covered eyes. If the ticklish pop
of foaming fizz that trickled up to her ankles before petering away would’ve sent a happiness so powerful through her bones that it nearly took her to her knees.

  By the time Linc came up behind her and removed her ear buds—filling the previously silent canal with the music of Emma’s laughter as well as the unmistakable crash of waves—Mia had already traveled almost every spectrum of emotion she was capable of. When he removed the blindfold around her eyes next, revealing the breathtaking turquoise waters of the deserted South African beach, she had already been fully encased in the breathtaking contentment that the sight before her allotted in the deepest depths of her soul.

  Mere moments after the vision she’d been begging for during the entire drive up there had been restored, and she was free to drink in the beautiful beach—as well as the sprawling, mossy cliffs that rose into the sky on either side of them—she found herself closing her eyes once more.

  “That’s freedom to you? Sand between your toes? That’s it?” Linc grinned.

  “And the waves. The waves too. The bubbles against my skin. God, the bubbles.”

  As if he could read her mind. As if he could see her revisiting one of the many conversations they’d had when they’d first met, one of the many secrets she’d whispered to him from the deepest pits of her heart, Linc’s arms came around Mia’s waist from behind.

  Her eyes fluttered open, a serene smile on her lips, breathing deep at his touch. Her breath came up short, however, when she saw that Linc was holding up a piece of paper in one hand with the other still locked around her waist.

  She frowned down at the paper he presented to her, and tears instantly burned her eyes when she realized what she was looking at. A photo of her, at thirteen. The last school photo she’d ever had taken before she’d disappeared from her home in Florida without a trace. A photo that her mother had always hated because of the small piece of flyaway hair that had gotten away from her ponytail. Above the photo in big, bold, bright red letters, there it was:

  MISSING

  And below the photo:

  HAVE YOU SEEN THIS GIRL?

  Ashley Kolinsky

  Thirteen years old. African-American. Slim build. Last seen on July 22, 1999, wearing blue jeans shorts and a pink bikini top. If you know where Ashley is, please contact us at (305) 823-4650. If you have any information whatsoever, please call the Miami Police at (305) 603-2834.

  Mia’s face crumpled as she read the phone number that she still remembered. The number that was a direct line to the living room of her family’s house. The number she’d once recited excitedly to old friends, new friends, and the first boyfriend she’d ever had in her home in Miami, Florida. A number Linc himself would have no way of knowing or finding out, proving the flyer was legitimate and not just a heartfelt gesture. She slapped a hand over her trembling mouth as her watery eyes dashed over the words in disbelief. She must’ve read them a hundred times, over and over, her mouth falling slowly open behind her shaking hand before her eyes zoomed over her shoulder to Linc, stunned.

  Linc shook his head when their eyes met, just as the waves rolled in once more, submerging their feet under the cool waters, the bubbles tickling their skin.

  “They never stopped looking for you, baby,” he said, his own voice wobbly with the strength of feeling taking over her face. “They never stopped—”

  Mia turned in his arms before he could finish, locking her arms around his neck and pulling him into a hug so furious it took both their breath away. He hugged her just as tightly in return.

  She didn’t bother asking him how he’d gotten his hands on that flyer because it didn’t matter. It didn’t even matter that she could never take the risk of going to see her parents, who she now knew had never stopped looking for her because it was too dangerous. Because a trafficked girl who’d escaped the trade could never return home where her captors would always come looking. Willing to draw fatal blood to reclaim what was “rightfully” theirs. At that moment, Mia would have given anything to go home and hug her parents again, and even though she knew she never could, deep down, she still knew she’d be okay.

  Because, in a way, she was still home.

  Her new home.

  As she and Linc embraced, the waves rolled in again, making the sand between her toes shift and move, the bubbles popping against their ankles.

  “Thank you,” she whispered into his neck, her trembling voice only causing his hold on her to tighten once more.

  “I love you so much, Mia.”

  “I love you, too.”

  Emma raced up and came in between them, wedging herself into the only space that remained between their tightly sealed bodies—the tight cavern between their calves, and stood tall.

  Linc and Mia took the smallest step away from each other to make room for the curly blonde head that had just popped up between them, their laughter rising into the air as they made room for her in the loving hug, as well.

  They made room without hesitation. Not just for Emma, but for the yellow stuffed bear she clutched against her chest. The bear that hadn’t left her hands since the moment her father had first handed it to her. The bear that had joined Mia and Linc on their entire explosive journey—from the desperate beginning, the passionate middle, and even the bloody end—before finally landing in the arms of its rightful owner. The rightful owner who’d also landed in the arms of her rightful owners. The two people who would love her, cherish her, and hold onto her just as tightly as she always held onto that bright yellow bear.

  Her lifeblood.

  Her saviors.

  Her family.

  Epilogue

  The waves and bubbles continued to tickle their bare feet nearly a year later as they walked hand-in-hand along a flawless beach in Cape Verde, an island country just off the coast of West Africa.

  An island with no extradition.

  The island was a short drive from the home they’d built a few miles away and just as majestic. Linc wore a white t-shirt and white cargo shorts while Mia and Emma donned matching yellow sundresses. As they strolled, Mia tightened her hold on Linc’s fingers with her right hand and Emma’s with her left. Her heartbeat tripled, causing her to squeeze harder.

  “Ouch!” Emma cried, slowing in mid-skip to glare up at Mia.

  Mia clenched her teeth when she realized the diamond ring on her left finger had shifted and nicked Emma’s skin. “Sorry.”

  Placated by her genuine regret, Emma gave all her attention back to the iPad she held in her free hand. The yellow stuffed bear she’d once worshiped had been replaced by the habit-forming device, which had held her captive since the moment she’d ripped the wrapping paper from the box during their first Christmas together, months earlier.

  “Gotta get it sized, baby.” Linc’s deep voice pulled Mia’s eyes back to him. “Been telling you since the wedding.”

  “I’ve been meaning too, but…” She didn’t finish, a lump moving down her throat.

  “Don’t be nervous,” he said.

  She shook her hair out of her face when the beach’s soft gust blew her strands across it.

  Her eyes narrowed. “I’m not.”

  He smirked but didn’t dignify the lie as the three continued their trek across the sand toward the lone beach mansion that waved at them from atop a hill in the distance.

  Small, colorful abandoned ships littered the white sand for miles around, begging to be boarded and reacquainted with the water. A handful of them bobbed in the water as well, several miles out. For the most part, however, the private beach went empty. Its turquoise waters largely unblemished by the heedless touch of mankind.

  Mia knew she’d earned that dubious smirk from Linc. It was the first time in her life that the crash of the waves licking her ears, the bubbles popping between her toes, and the distinct smell of seaweed tickling her nose didn’t ease her heart.

  Even as he smirked at her, Mia also didn’t miss the way Linc’s fingers twitched from where they were entwined with hers. The way hi
s chest rose high once they’d finally made it to the long wooden staircase that led up to the beach house they’d been trudging toward. The way his free hand reached up to smooth his hair—pulled back in the slickest bun she’d ever seen him accomplish. Even his cheeks heated up once they’d cleared the staircase, finding themselves trudging across an expansive, grassy front yard, still several hundred feet away from the house that was reddening his face.

  Emma appeared to be the only member of the family who hadn’t a care in the world, her green eyes locked to the game on her iPad, with a pep in her step that refused to let up. Her blonde curls danced with the wind as well, as if it had sucked up all the carefree serenity that neither Linc nor Mia could manage. Emma’s pace only slowed when she got especially into her game—forcing Mia to drag her along—her eyebrows pinched in concentration, her tiny thumb dancing all over the screen.

  After clearing the staircase they found themselves faced with a sprawling, beautifully landscaped yard that faced the back of the house. Sharp shards of grass crunched under their feet as they began across it, growing nearer to the home every second. Before they’d even made it to the halfway point of the expansive yard, the backdoor to the house flew open.

  Linc was the first to freeze in his tracks, causing a domino effect as Mia followed suit, making Emma trip over her own feet even though the sudden stop did nothing to tear her eyes away from her iPad.

  Mia instantly recognized the person who’d stopped Linc in his tracks—a slim, dark-skinned black woman wearing a formfitting white midi dress with big afro textured hair—as Veda Vandyke. A woman whose pictures Linc had shown Mia many times using the throwaway Instagram account he’d created solely to stalk the people he loved most. The people he loved most, but couldn’t risk communicating with, because he was an American fugitive. No longer a fugitive who was in the top ten, but a fugitive never-the-less.