Master of My Heart

by Marissa Honeycutt

  “S-Sabrina?” Eloise asked in a nervous voice, looking around. No one was allowed to talk to Sabrina without permission. “What are you doing here? You missed classes this week. Is everything all right?”

  Sabrina chewed her lip for a moment as she contemplated what to say. “I’m okay,” she finally answered in a soft voice. “Is Mr. Baker here?”

  Eloise glanced at the clock on the wall. “He’ll be here in a few minutes.”

  It occurred to Sabrina that she had no idea what day it was. A subtle look at the desk calendar told her it was Friday. The clock on the wall said it was almost four. The last thing she remembered was waking up Sunday morning.

  She’d blacked out before, but not for this long. When she’d killed before, Ramon said she blacked out for a day or so. But when he or Khyan worked her over to the point where she couldn’t move, she’d sleep as long as it took to heal.

  The sound of gunshots echo through my mind. Miguel, one of Ramon’s men, aims a gun at me. He shoots. I feel a slight sting in my side, but it just makes me angrier. I lunge at him as he shoots again—

  Sabrina swallowed hard and pushed the image away. She didn’t want to remember what she did.

  If she had been shot, though, that would explain the extended time of healing sleep.

  Sabrina dropped into one of the hard leather chairs along the wall and twisted Chase’s ring around her thumb.

  As the seconds ticked by and she stared at the abstract pattern of the carpet below her feet, doubts began to creep in about coming to see Mr. Baker. The last thing she wanted to do was put him, or anyone else, in danger. But she had no idea how to get to Boston. No idea how to buy a plane ticket or even where the airport was. She was only sixteen when she was taken and had lived in a tiny bubble of hell ever since. Ramon only ever let her go to the ballet studio and the occasional outing when he needed help with a business deal.

  She needed help, but would it endanger Mr. Baker and Eloise?

  Before she could decide whether to stay or go, Mr. Baker walked through the glass door. He stopped short when he saw her, his expression a combination of apprehension and curiosity.

  “Sabrina? Are you all right?”

  She stared at him for a long moment, focused on the few strands of red hair left in his otherwise white hair, still debating the wisdom of coming here. “I need help,” she whispered, cringing at the words that might get him hurt. Or worse.

  He glanced at Eloise, then back at Sabrina. “Where’s Ramon?”

  Sabrina blinked and swallowed hard. “Dead.”

  Mr. Baker blinked, too. She wasn’t certain, but she thought she saw relief in his expression. “And Khyan?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. He’s been gone for . . .” She chewed her lip, “ . . . a while,” she finished lamely. “I need to get away before he comes back,” she added in a whisper, somehow imagining that if she didn’t speak very loudly, Khyan would never find her. She winced at a shooting pain in her head as her heart began to pound again, this time with fear of being caught before she could get out of town.

  Mr. Baker looked at her for a long time. His face remained impassive, but she saw the conflict in his eyes. Fear . . . determination . . . worry.

  Sabrina wondered how much, if anything, he knew about her situation.

  Finally, he nodded. “How can I help?” he asked, sitting down next to her. “I’m glad you’re here, Sabrina. I’ve worried about you ever since you started dancing with us.”

  “You have?” Sabrina’s mouth dropped open in surprise. He’d never given any indication of caring about her. He only spoke to her of things concerning the ballet. Never even asked how she was doing, except that one time when she’d woken up and didn’t know where she was. Khyan had gotten so angry . . .

  Mr. Baker nodded. “I knew something wasn’t right with your situation, but the board insisted that I not ask questions.” He tilted his head. “I won’t ask questions now, but I will do whatever I can to help.” He patted her hand.

  She let out a breath and felt her body relax. “Thank you.”

  He smiled and they looked at each other for a moment. “How can I help?” he repeated gently.

  “I want to go to Boston.” The words escaped her mouth before she realized it, and she was shocked at how confident she sounded. She certainly didn’t feel confident.

  “Boston, eh?” Mr. Baker chuckled. “I think you’d do well there, but there are many fine companies around the country. Heck, you could go to Europe, Sabrina.”

  His comment made her pause. “Really?”

  He nodded. “You are an amazing dancer. You should be somewhere you will shine.”

  Sabrina felt warmed to the center of her being at his genuine enthusiasm. “I appreciate that, Mr. Baker,” she said, the spark of hope she had started to feel earlier fanning into a flame. “But I . . .” She inhaled deeply, the thought of seeing Chase again making her heart flutter. “I know people there.”

  Mr. Baker’s brows drew together. “I didn’t know you had any family.”

  She shook her head. “Not family. I did an intensive there before—” She frowned. “I was there when I was sixteen. Martin was so kind . . .” She closed her eyes and remembered the feeling of being wanted for a professional company. Remembered Martin, the director of the company, urging her to come dance with them even before she graduated high school.

  And Chase. Chase! Her heart ached, longing to see him again.

  “You know Martin?” Mr. Baker asked, interrupting her thoughts.

  She opened her eyes and nodded, the thought of being in that wonderful city making her feel as if she could fly. “Do you?”

  “We danced together a long time ago.” A slight smile appeared on his face before he slapped his hands on his thighs and stood. “I think you’re finding favor with the universe. Boston is having auditions next week.” He smiled warmly. “Let me find the information and we’ll get you there.”

  *****

  “Are you okay to drive?” Mr. Baker asked as Sabrina settled into the driver’s seat of the SUV sometime later.

  They’d decided she’d be safer if she drove the hour and a half to Phoenix and stayed there overnight before taking a bus to Northern Arizona the next afternoon. Early Sunday morning, she’d get on a train and start the three-day journey to Boston. Mr. Baker suggested a train because it was a less obvious mode of travel. And since the auditions weren’t until next week, she’d be constantly moving until then and harder to find. Of course, once she was in Boston . . . Well, she’d be thousands of miles away. She’d find Chase and his mom and be safe.

  She hoped.

  Sabrina clenched the steering wheel, her knuckles turning white, and nodded. “I have to be,” she said with a forced smile.

  Mr. Baker handed her the two bags of clothing and other items Eloise had purchased while they were making plans. She put them on the passenger seat. He leaned in and hugged her tightly. “Be safe,” he said, kissing her cheek.

  She hugged him back. Hard. “Thank you,” she whispered, tears of gratitude filling her eyes. “You, too.”

  He gave her a tight smile. “Keep it between the lines, follow the directions on the screen, and you’ll be fine.”

  She nodded, glancing over at the fancy GPS system in the center of the car’s dashboard. “I remember my parents had one of these,” she said, a twinge of sadness in her heart.

  Mr. Baker closed the door. She waved before putting the car in drive and pulling away from the sidewalk. When she glanced in the rear-view mirror, she saw the door to the studio closing, Mr. Baker gone from sight.

  Phoenix was a much bigger city and easier to hide in. The GPS would guide her directly to the cheap motel near the bus station. It wasn’t a very nice place, but it took cash, and that was what mattered.

  Ninety nerve-wracking minutes of driving late
r, she pulled up in front of the seedy-looking motel, thankful she made it safely. After checking in with the creepy-looking middle-aged man at the front desk, she found her room for the night and unlocked the door. It clearly hadn’t been updated since the 1980s, as evidenced by the pink-flowered bedspread and matching curtains. The bathroom ceramics were yellowed with age, but clean.

  Sabrina sighed deeply as she sat down on the surprisingly comfortable bed. Step one was done. She was over a hundred miles from the compound and feeling safer already.

  Mostly.

  Doubts threatened to creep in again as she fought back the fear of Khyan slamming open the door and dragging her back to hell.

  But how could he find her? She was no longer Immortal. She was human. Could he trace humans?

  She had to look forward, not backward. Otherwise, she’d drive herself insane with worry.

  Later, when the sun had almost disappeared behind the mountains, she ventured out in search of dinner. A fast-food burger place was only a few hundred feet from the motel. Not wanting to be out in the open too long, she ordered her food to go before hurrying back to her room. No one bothered her while she was out, but she sighed in relief when she was safely back inside her room behind the locked door.

  She ate, then fell asleep with the TV on.

  *****

  The bus to Flagstaff didn’t leave until the afternoon, so Sabrina spent the morning watching TV, something she hadn’t done in five years. It kept her mind off her fears of being caught.

  After lunch, she put on the ball cap Eloise had included in her purchases and walked the few blocks to the bus station. She picked an aisle seat on the crowded bus, thinking it would be safer to not be by the window. Each mile took her farther and farther from hell and brought her closer to safety. She couldn’t help but smile a little. If Khyan had returned and not found her yet, she felt confident he wouldn’t find her now.

  At least that was what she kept telling herself. She had to stay positive.

  A new life awaited her in Boston.

  She would get there a little later than expected, but she would get there.

  And it would be wonderful.

  Before dawn on Sunday morning, Sabrina sat in her private room on the train heading east, hope blossoming in her heart once more. In the glass of the window, she could see herself grinning, practically from ear to ear. She felt free for the first time in years!

  I’m free!

  She looked past her reflection and watched the scenery as it passed. Her heart was full. For the first time since she was taken, she felt optimistic for her future. Hell, she now had a future for the first time since she was sixteen.

  Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Chase’s handsome face. The earnestness in his eyes as he handed her his ring, which she wore on the thumb of her left hand. It was too big, but she wanted his memory at the forefront of her mind.

  The landscape changed subtly over the next few hours as the train moved eastward into New Mexico. Mountains she’d never seen before, rivers she’d never crossed . . . They all passed by her window as she watched her new life unfold before her.

  She sighed deeply, breathing in unrestricted air. She dozed occasionally, relaxing into her freedom. When the train stopped in Albuquerque mid-afternoon, she stepped out to get some fresh air, not worrying about what anyone thought.

  I am my own person.

  I am happy.

  I am free.

  Chapter Five

  At dinner that night, Sabrina sat next to an older woman traveling alone. When it was time for meals, passengers were assigned a time, then seated with random strangers in the train’s central dining car. They did have the option of eating in their room, but Sabrina was trying to be brave. She ate in her room at lunch, but for dinner, she decided to eat with everybody else. It was so different from what she’d become accustomed to. A good kind of different.

  Charlene, Sabrina’s dinner companion, was a sixty-something, vibrant grandmother of nine who was traveling to see her second grandson at college in Kansas. She told stories of her daughter that made Sabrina’s heart ache for her own mother—the mother who raised her. And her biological mother and grandmother.

  All of them died horrific deaths.

  During a lull in their conversation, she stared out the window and blinked hard.

  Charlene put her hand on the younger woman’s. “Are you all right, dear?”

  Sabrina nodded and blinked, trying to make the tears go away before turning back to her.

  “Do you see your mother often?” the older woman asked.

  “She—” Sabrina’s voice caught in her throat. She swallowed and stared for a moment, then shook her head. “She died.” The dying screams of the woman who raised her echoed through her mind. She blinked rapidly to make the tears go away. It didn’t work.

  Charlene’s face immediately softened into sympathy. “Oh my. I’m so sorry.” She tilted her head. “Was it recent?”

  The question made Sabrina stop and think for a moment. How long ago was that? She thought back to the calendar in Mr. Baker’s office. It had been five years since her parents’ murder. Five years! That meant she was twenty years—

  No, it was almost the middle of September. She was twenty-one!

  Where had her life gone?

  Sabrina stared at her plate of spaghetti and felt her stomach clench. She tried to swallow past the lump in her throat.

  Chase . . .

  She exhaled, feeling as if she’d been punched in the chest. There was no way he would have waited for her. The last few days, she’d been dreaming of what it would be like to arrive in Boston and see him again, but it had been five years!

  What a foolish girl she was. No man in his right mind would wait that long without communication from a girl. Sabrina buried her face in her hands and pressed her fingers against her eyeballs until she saw gold sparkles.

  She was no longer the sweet, innocent girl he met on the yacht that night. That was stolen away within a few days of meeting him.

  Her heart no longer ached with longing, but with sorrow. Grief burned in her chest and she wanted to scream. She scooted quickly across the bench seat to the aisle, knocking her plate to the floor. Charlene called after her, but she ignored her as she hurried through the car and into the next one, searching for the bathroom. She needed to be alone.

  She locked the door and turned to stare at herself in the mirror, leaning her hands on the cold steel sink. How long had it been since she really looked at herself? Her long, dark hair hung around her thin face and prominent cheekbones, falling down her chest. Her figure was more womanly than she remembered. Her eyes were still the same pale green, but there was something different in them than before. Sadness.

  Who was this stranger staring back at her?

  Her childhood, so close to being complete when she arrived home from Boston, had been snatched away in the blink of an eye. In an instant, she was turned from an innocent girl into a monster and whore.

  She let out a cry and collapsed onto the floor. Sobs wracked her body as she bit her fist, hoping the pain would negate the growing anguish in her heart.

  She had no one to go to in Boston.

  Chase had surely moved on. Maybe he was even married with kids by now.

  Oh God! The thought of him happily married to another woman made her want to pull her hair out. She grasped a handful and let out a hoarse cry.

  I have nothing.

  I’ve lost everything.

  *****

  Later that night, Sabrina stared blankly out the window, her mind wandering aimlessly through her memories.

  She saw her parents taking her to the airport . . . Saw Chase for the first time at the festival . . . The flutter in her heart . . . Meeting him and his mother at the banquet on the yacht . . . Dancing with him. Talking with him. That
kiss. Losing her heart.

  Then another memory, longer and stronger, filled her mind . . .

  The man turns back to Khyan. “You should have retrieved her sooner. Now she will be more difficult to break. Her heart is awake.”

  His words make me smile slightly. Defiance lights a flame in my heart. I lift my chin and glare at the two men. The blond man gives me an icy grin. “I said difficult, not impossible, Sabrina. I do enjoy a challenge, and you will be my triumph.” He arches a brow. “Breaking you will be a pleasure for both me and the men in this house.” He steps closer and grabs my chin. “You will be mine to control and use, the journey to that point long and painful. For you. Pleasurable for me.” He tilts his head. “It will happen, I assure you. How long and how painful is up to you, though.” He smiles, eyes lighting with demented delight. “I’ve been waiting for this for so long, I don’t want to wait any longer.” He begins to unbutton his shirt, and I step back.

  Khyan is still in the room, and I glance back at him in horror as he begins to undress, as well. I scream, remembering what happened to my mother.

  “Scream all you’d like. It won’t do any good,” the man says, shrugging out of his shirt to reveal a trim upper body, not unlike the male dancers I know. When he reaches for his belt, I squeeze my eyes shut. He laughs. “Such innocence will be a feast for my body. By all means, continue to deny what’s going to happen, but in a few minutes, you’ll be screaming in pleasure and begging for more.”

  I open my eyes, keeping my gaze purposely on his face. “You think I’ll enjoy you raping me?”

  “Oh Sabrina, Sabrina.” He shakes his head and sighs. “What makes you think I’m going to rape you?”

  I press my lips together, ignoring the fear bubbling up inside me. “Why should I think any differently?”

  I hear his pants drop to the floor and he steps toward me. I step back again and feel hard flesh against my back. Khyan. I try to move sideways, but he grabs me around my waist. I whimper as he presses me back against him. I don’t feel any clothing and can only assume he’s naked, too.