by SR Jones
Sometimes she’s brave, and I respect her, but at other moments her youth shows. “It’s not a prison, Roze,” I state sternly. “It will be a fucking gorgeous condo, with a pool, and the best amenities. The sort of place ninety percent of the world’s population would give anything to live in.”
Her eyes narrow a little, but she doesn’t say anything. I head into the kitchen and open the fridge that’s been fully stocked. “Okay, you need to drink and eat something if you can face it. Then you can take a shower. There’s a bathroom upstairs that has everything you need in it, or so I’ve been told. If you need anything that’s not here let me know.”
I pull her into the kitchen by taking hold of her wrist gently, and she comes, compliant and easy. For a moment the way she so naturally follows my lead has my mind turning to darker, sexual thoughts. I shut that tap right off. Immediately.
I turn on the light and get a good look at her. I don’t like the pallor of her skin. It’s as if now we’re here, safe for now, her adrenaline is wearing off and she’s crashing.
“You okay?” I ask her.
She nods. “I feel a bit sick, but I’m okay.”
“Sit here,” I order, pulling a stool up for her.
She sits on it heavily and stares at her feet.
What I can see of her face is forlorn, and her body posture is dejected. Fuck.
I tip her chin and examine her face. There’s a light bruise on her cheekbone. “They hurt you anywhere else?”
She nods, stands, and lifts her nightdress. It rises over her thighs, over her black panties, and I swallow thickly as the material skims her curvy hips and a small waist. She halts the rise before her breasts, thank God, but then I see what she’s showing me, and my momentary attraction turns to rage.
Her ribs are bruised. I lean in and touch one, and she sucks in a breath.
“Motherfuckers.”
“Yes. They were. I don’t think they’re broken. They don’t hurt enough for that. It is sore though.”
“Even if they are broken, treatment’s pretty much the same as it is for bruised ribs,” I tell her. “Take it easy and let them heal.”
How the hell did she run after me with ribs like that? My estimation of her rises sharply. This sort of shit is what me and my men do, but not something I’d expect a terrified young woman to have to do. She’s fucking brave.
“No binding them?” She drops her nightdress, smooths the fabric, and sits back down.
“No, they don’t do that these days. Say it causes pneumonia.”
“Oh, well, I don’t want that.”
She laughs, but winces as she does so.
I don’t think they’re broken. Probably not even that badly bruised, or I think her pain level would be higher, but they’re still going to be sore for a week or so, and she’s still a bad ass.
For some reason, her bad-assery only turns me onto her more.
She looks young, scared, and vulnerable, though, despite it. I remind myself of those facts and tell my stupid libido to behave.
I don’t fuck around. I’m not led by my dick, so why it has decided to get itself in a state about a woman now, this woman, I have no clue.
Placing a bottle of water in front of her, I undo the cap. “Drink.”
“Yes, sir,” she says.
I bite back a smile at her sass as I open the fridge. It’s stocked full. Lots of meat, cheese, fresh produce. Great.
“You want a chicken sandwich?” I ask her, looking at the fresh sliced roast chicken.
“Ugh, no. I’m vegetarian,” she says.
Christ.
“You eat cheese?”
“Of course, I said vegetarian not vegan.”
“Excuse me if I don’t know the difference between fad diets.”
“Fad diets?” she explodes. “Vegetarianism isn’t a fad diet. It’s the diet of millions, probably billions of people in this world.”
“Deluded people,” I say under my breath. Who wants to live without steak?
“I suppose you’re a huntin’, fishin’ kind of a guy.” She puts on a truly bad American accent.
I turn to her and shrug. “As it happens, yep.”
“Oh my God. Really? You kill animals.”
Is she fucked in the head? I kill people. Shooting a deer that will feed me for months is no hardship. It’s kinder than buying factory farmed meat too.
I don’t say any of it. Ninety percent of the time, I don’t say the shit in my head. I can’t be bothered.
“Seriously? Do you hunt?” she asks again.
“Yes, why? Want a new security detail?”
“No. Just makes me see you differently.”
Good. If it makes her lose the googly hero-worship eyes, great. I almost tell her about the last time I shot a deer but decide not to because I don’t want her throwing up on me.
I take out some cheese slices, a ripe tomato, cucumber, butter, and mayo and put together a sandwich. I slap it down on a plate and hand it to her. “Eat this. I’m going to fetch the bags and feed the dogs.”
The owner of the house fed them this morning, but they’ll be hungry again by now.
She gives me a look I can’t decipher, but she bites into the sandwich, chews like it is sawdust, and swallows.
“What’s the matter? Not nice?” She’s annoying me now.
“No. I just feel sick, I told you. I’ll eat it, though, because I know I need to.”
Okay. That’s good. “Good.”
I head out of the room and get busy bringing the bags in, trying not to think about all the ways she intrigues me.
Chapter 5
It takes me about twenty minutes to force the sandwich down. Normally I love my food but after all I’ve been through, my stomach keeps wanting to rebel at me putting stuff in it. By the time I’m done, Priest has brought all the bags in. He’s also divested himself of his camo jacket and is now wearing the camo pants, but with a dark green t-shirt. It fits him tight around his huge shoulders and cuts high on impressive biceps.
He must have wiped his face because most of the camo is gone, with just a few smears left.
He’s even bigger than I had realized. He must be Jason Momoa size, easily. He hauls the bag onto the table and the muscles in his arms ripple.
As he rummages through the bag, I take in his features. Dark, hooded eyes. I think they’re a dark blue, but it’s hard to tell. Roman nose, strong jawline. Most definitely not a pretty boy. His face is kind of craggy. I wonder how old he is.
There’s something about him though, a kind of sense of power he gives off that makes him attractive even if he’s not usually the sort of man I go for. I like sleek, handsome men, who are well put together.
I don’t like rugged, long haired men who wear thick silver rings and look like they belong in a biker gang. Or…I didn’t. Until Priest. He makes me feel safe.
I imagine what it must be like to be wrapped tight in those massive arms. I bet he’s warm to cuddle up to.
His gaze snaps up to meet mine and for a moment I can’t look away. There’s heat in his stare, and a little bit of anger too, I think. It gives me the shivers. Yeah, he might not be handsome, but he’s intensely charismatic.
There’s just something so proficient about him. A man who can handle himself, and his surroundings, and that makes him sexy as hell.
“Here,” he looks at me again, but the heat is gone. “There’s some clothes.” He passes me a bundle of clean scented cotton and I want to put it to my face and inhale because I stink, and the clean clothes smell so damn good. I don’t though. I hold them to my chest as if they’re precious instead, which to me, right now, they are.
“I’ll show you the shower and your room.” He walks out of the kitchen and I follow him.
“This is your bedroom,” he states, pushing open a door once we reach the upstairs.
It’s a nice room. Simply furnished, clean, and fresh.
“Mine is right next door. You need anything, you know where I am. You h
ave an attached bathroom, through here.” He crosses the room and pushes open another door.
I peer inside. There’s a bathroom with a toilet, sink, and shower. No bath. I’d love a soak in a bath right now, but a shower is more practical I suppose. I do need to wash my hair and get the filth off my body, not soak in it.
I glance at the shelf above the sink and see two new toothbrushes still in their plastic wrappers. Toothpaste. Small bars of soap still wrapped. Those dinky shampoo and conditioner bottles you get in hotels. I glance at the door, half expecting to see a fluffy toweling robe but there isn’t one.
“I’ll leave you to freshen up and get changed.” Priest moves to the door.
“Where will you be?” I ask. I’m feeling all kinds of skittish. The idea of being alone, even for the time it takes to shower, freaks me out for some reason.
“I’ll be right next door, taking my own shower.”
“Okay.”
“I’m only in the next room, Roze,” he says, clearly understanding my freak out. “The fence is switched on. The security feed is working and feeding into our men at the base, and a friend in Athens for good measure. There will always be someone watching it for us. They have my number. Anything, and I mean anything, out of the ordinary, and they’ll call. The dogs are outside. The drone is. And I’m a Navy SEAL and anyone wanting to come for you again, has to get through me.”
“A SEAL?”
I nod. “Yes, so you’re safe. Okay? Take your shower. Get yourself cleaned up and changed.”
I nod, and he leaves the room. The moment he goes, I sag against the wall. The terror of everything that has happened washes over me and I start to shake. It’s as if I’m freezing cold, except I’m not, I simply can’t seem to stop trembling.
“Pull yourself together, Roze,” I say sternly. “Get in the damn shower, wash the blood and gore from your skin and pull yourself together.”
The pep talk works enough to allow me to make my limbs move and turn on the shower. I’m being guarded by a SEAL. A six and a half foot, wall of muscle, SEAL. I can allow myself to shake and go to pieces for a little while at least because the man in the next room will keep me safe.
I throw the awful nightdress off and kick it away from me. I never want to see it again. There’s a mirror and I look at myself in it. My face is gaunt. Haunted. Glancing down my body, there are bruises on my thighs where that fucker Red grabbed me. My ribs are bruised, my cheek too. My wrists have marks where the zip ties were too tight.
I ache all over as if I have a fever but know it will be from the stress of the past few days. Muscles that were tense and on edge due to ongoing fear are now painfully relaxing.
Glancing at the clothes Priest gave me, I see a pair of plain black panties, a bra top, the kind you wear for yoga, some sweatpants, a t-shirt, and a comfy sweater. I smile. The clothes are perfect. I need to hide away. To cover myself in comfort and bagginess. If the clothes had contained sexy underwear, I’d have felt threatened. Not by anyone in particular. The underwear itself would have been enough to make me feel too feminine, too vulnerable.
These clothes are almost unisex. Asexual.
I think of Priest seeing me in sexier things. Do I want Priest to view me as a sexual being? I’m not sure. He’s attractive to me. I want to be by his side. And I want him to hold me for some unknown reason. Do I want sex with him?
The thought makes me pulse between my legs, but then Red’s face swims into view, and I shudder. I’m a virgin because my dad scares off anyone who knows who he is, and I don’t think it’s fair to involve anyone in my life who doesn’t know who he is.
Doesn’t mean I don’t want sex. I do. In fact, one might say I’ve been more than a little bit obsessed with the idea for a couple of years now. My libido has been raging.
I’ve spent many a night watching porn or reading steamy romance novels with my trusty vibrator but it’s not the same as the real thing. I want warm arms around me, and the scent of a man next to me.
Or I did until Red.
Priest isn’t Red though. Priest is my savior. My hero. He even smelled damn heroic. Priest smelled of oil, leather, the outdoors, and man. I wonder what he smells like when he’s not in soldier…damn it, sailor, mode?
I wonder what kind of woman he likes.
Probably not the type I am. I know I’m beautiful. I’ve been told it enough times in my life. My friends refer to me as “the pretty one” when anyone doesn’t know me by name. I’m not naïve enough though to think being beautiful in and of itself, will be enough to attract a man like Priest. I bet he dates women who are tough, successful. Maybe he’s married?
The thought hits me hard and I shake my head. I turn the shower on and when it reaches a nice temperature step under the spray.
Bliss.
The water raining down on me is heaven. Truly heaven. It washes away the blood. The dirt. It washes away Red and his vile touch.
The moment I pour shampoo into my hands and lather my hair, I start crying softly. I don’t know why I’m crying over shampoo. It makes me feel human, I suppose, after days when I felt anything but.
Those men made me nothing more than a worthless animal to be cruelly treated. They pushed me around. Laughed at me. Worse of all, even before Red started his shit, they spent days making never-ending sexual innuendo about me, and implicit threats. It was humiliating. Nerve wracking. Now, I’m safe thanks to an American military man who decided to come get me by himself, and in doing so took out four men silently, and so deadly.
He’s my hero.
No matter what else happens in my life, Priest will always by my hero.
My father was when I was small, but he isn’t any longer. Not if he is involved in the shit Red said he was. The thought has the panic rising again, so I push it down. I don’t normally shove things down. It’s not a healthy coping mechanism, but I have no choice because I must get through these next few days without cracking up.
I don’t know though if I can stick to the plan I came up with in the car about waiting until I’m qualified to support myself. I don’t know if I can keep on taking his money and letting him have his hired men guard over me moving forward.
Where will I go? If I disown my father how will I support myself until I qualify and finish my degree?
“Don’t think about it yet, there’s time,” I tell myself as I lather rich conditioner into my hair.
I wonder if Priest would be the driver Father says I must have. By driver, I know Dad means bodyguard. I feel so safe with Priest. Does he do long term work? I should ask him.
As I shower, I find myself even second guessing the degree I’m studying. I know why I chose psychology, and criminal psychology in particular. I’m not an idiot. I wanted to understand my own father better. However, after spending days in the charming company of the idiots who took me, I no longer am sure I have any desire to figure out the criminal mind.
My degree is interesting, but I wouldn’t say it makes me happy. The only time I feel truly happy is when I’m on the ocean. Sailing makes me happy.
The water starts to run cool and I don’t want to use all the heat so Priest has none.
Finishing washing off, I step out, dry myself and apply some of the body lotion I found in another small bottle. It smells gorgeous. Soft, like lavender. It’s such a small thing but it’s the kind of thing I don’t think I’ll ever take for granted again.
For much of the past seventy-two hours, I’ve honestly thought I was about to die. Body lotion is a startling juxtaposition to that. A sign not only of luxury, but of safety.
Dressed in the clothes Priest bought for me, I head out of the bathroom, using the small comb amongst the toiletries to pull the knots out of my hair. There doesn’t seem to be a hairdryer. I look in all the bedroom drawers but can’t find one. My hair is long and thick. It will take hours to dry without help, and it’s making my back wet. Damn.
I look in the final drawer but come up empty handed. Maybe there’s one in Priest’s r
oom?
Stepping out of my door, I head to his, and knock. The door doesn’t open so I knock again. No answer. Shit, is he okay?
Panic hits me. If he’s not okay, then I’m alone again, without my savior. I can’t bear to be alone again. I don’t even think before I push open the door.
The bathroom door is ajar, and steam comes wafting out.
“Priest?” I call.
He appears in the steam like some giant from a mythic tale. His hair is down and wet like mine. It hangs around his massive shoulders. He’s only wearing a towel around his hips and I just stare.
I can’t help myself.
I’ve seen plenty of half-naked guys. I live on the Croatian coast and in the summer, it is full of the beautiful people. I’ve never seen a man who looks like Priest though.
He reminds me of those guys in that film about the Greek warriors. The ones with the massive muscles and the insane abs. Every bit of him is pure strength.
His skin is tan, and shining with the water, highlighting his outrageous pecs. His arms are works of art, and dear God, his stomach.
Realizing, I’m being rude and acting like jerk guys do, I force my gaze to his face. He’s watching me, his expression closed off.
“Can I help you?”
“Yes, erm, sorry. Do you have a hairdryer? There isn’t one in my room.”
“I don’t know. I’ll take a look.” He stalks out of the bathroom and starts opening and shutting drawers.
I try not to stare at his ass in the towel. I swear to all that is holy I try, but I fail. It’s too amazing. Too spectacular. My friend, Chrissie, she’s doing a fine art degree, and I bet she’d have to draw Priest if she saw him.
I frown at the marks on his body. A jagged one on his side, starting at his back and going around to his front. A white line on his lower leg, which looks like a scar from being cut. I have one on my palm where a tin can cut into me years ago. A round scar on his upper arm.
“Here you go,” he says, taking a dryer out of a drawer and handing it to me, stopping my cataloguing of his past injuries.
