“I’ve kept her as comfortable as possible,” Trace said as we walked the corridor to the cell at the end. “She’s had furniture brought in, she chooses from a daily menu and I’ve had my mother arrange some clothes for her.”
“I’m sure she appreciates it.”
“She seems to. She’s different, Eli. Unlike the broken women we’ve rescued before.”
“How so?”
My cousin stopped outside Annabella’s room and placed his hand on the handle. He pursed his lips and they twisted in confusion as he searched the ceiling of Sector 2 for the answer.
“I’m not sure. She’s just…stronger.”
“That can only work in our favour, cousin.” I placed my hand on his shoulder and pulled the key off from around my neck. “How was her evaluation?”
“Nothing untoward. Her physical examination showed signs of malnourishment. She’ll improve with a balanced diet. We recorded a number of scars, entered them in the database. No piercings, tattoos…not even a birthmark. The psychological examination was fine, too.” Trace twisted his lips again, and shook his head. “I can’t put my finger on it. Maybe she was taken recently. Maybe she’s resilient to the effects of being abducted. I expected shock or PTSD, or something, but she’s…fine.”
I shrugged, unalarmed. “I’ll see what she has to say and decide if she’s safe. We all deal with trauma in different ways, Trace.”
“I know that.”
“Give me an hour with her.” I bent down and Trace moved his hand in time for me to undo the lock. “I’ll see if I can find out more of what happened to her in Denmark.”
Trace nodded, comforted by the confidence I was surprised I could fake. The reaction to Annabella that was evident in my cousin, was the same sense of unease and uncertainty I felt whisper into my veins as I opened the door, checked my back pockets for what I’d put in there earlier, and then I stepped into the cell.
Annabella was on the bed in the corner of the room, with her legs bent up so her knees were under her chin, and she had her arms wrapped around her calves. She was curled up and defensive, but she hadn’t hidden her eyes. They shone towards me like beacons in the night when she glared at me as I stepped into the room.
“You.”
Raising my hands so she saw I meant no harm, I closed the door and pressed my back to the wall next to it.
“I didn’t take you.”
“Is the same,” she said, pointing languidly at my face and down my body. “Is the same.”
“I know that. But it wasn’t me. You don’t need to be afraid of me.”
“Men all the same. Men all say the same. All do the same.”
Her voice gave me chills. Goosebumps rose to caress my flesh and everything inside me seized up in fear and a strange sense of affection.
“Not me. I’m different.” She nodded, but said nothing. I took a step closer and reached into my pocket. “Here.”
I tossed her the contraband chocolate bar from the stock we had brought in from Switzerland throughout the year. Swiss chocolate was unlike any other, and I had a feeling Annabella would appreciate the finer side of creamy confectionary. She snatched up the bar, tore into the red wrapping and took off the first square of chocolate. Her eyes rolled closed and it was the first shred of relief I’d had since I’d walked in here. Finally, I could breathe, and I took the opportunity to suck in a lungful of air.
“Why you?” she asked. “Trace?”
“Trace has some work to do. He’ll be back. I want us to talk for a little while, is that okay?”
Annabella nodded, unfazed by the idea of conversing with me, and then she took another bite of the chocolate bar.
“May I sit?”
I was following Trace’s lead. I may have been the first born but I wasn’t ignorant to my cousin’s way with victims. I wasn’t unaware that he handled things differently to me…the many Eli’s I followed were brutal sadists and men with no mercy. But the Trace’s, Tracy’s, and even a Trevor who had laid out Trace’s path for him – they were nice guys. They’d been caring fathers, loving husbands and strong leaders. Trace was stronger than I could ever have a hope of being…all I could do was hurt. Annabella squealed, jumping back as I sat down, and I froze with my eyes on her. She covered her mouth with her hand and when she pulled it away, I glanced at down and saw a trickle of diluted crimson in her palm.
“I bit my tongue.”
Why did it bother me? Why did my instincts rear up, slam into me and try to force me into her? Why did I care that she’d bled, that she’d cut herself and was bleeding on the floor of the dungeon? I looked away when Annabella covered her mouth again, and I watched her throat work as she licked herself clean.
“Annabella…” I shifted, taking short breaths as the metallic scent of blood crept into my nostrils. “I need you to tell me your story. Beginning to end.”
Getting to my feet, I crossed the room and grabbed the bottle of water I’d brought in with me. I handed it to her and she snatched it up, tugging at the lid, frowning when the plastic cap remained fixed to the sports cap.
“You’ve never used one of these before?” She shook her head. “Here.”
I leaned forward and removed the lid for her, watching as she guzzled the water. I frowned. There was something about her—something naïve and uncouth. It was alluring and captivating, and entirely innocent, although it felt far from sin-free. I just couldn’t figure her out; my instincts failed when it came to Annabella, and had done since the day she crawled out the back of the van. One second she was sexual and sensual, emanating eroticism from head to toe, and the next she was just a child—afraid and uneducated, lost in a world that saw a victim locked in a prison cell. My connection with her felt alien, and yet it felt innate. Instantaneous. I felt like I knew her, without knowing anything about her.
“The story, Anna,” I growled, growing impatient and rapidly slinking into someone trained to deal with this. She was distracting. She was diverting. She was trying to manipulate me…wasn’t she?
“I was just a child. A baby. I don’t know all the stories.”
“Tell me what you know.”
I returned to where I’d stood in front of her and crouched down. She’d slowly unravelled, no longer curled in a ball in the corner. She looked no less afraid, although once again an aura of attraction bound us. I shook my head. Time to deal with this the right way. Leaning forward, I pressed my palm to her neck and curled my fingers around her throat, pushing her back to the wall.
“Where are you from?”
“Denmark. I was sent to Denmark when I was born.”
“And you’re a nurse?” She nodded. “A maternity nurse?” She nodded again. “And…?”
“Please,” she gasped. “Please, I cannot breathe.”
“Do you think you’d be breathing if we’d allowed your sale to the bastards who wanted to tear you apart?” Her eyes widened, her mouth agape as she tried to draw a breath. I wouldn’t let her. “Do you think they would have allowed you to breathe while they stripped the flesh from your bones and fucked whatever was left?”
She tried to shake her head, but I held her firm. I held her hard, and rough, and aggressive. Yet…it felt wrong. Even now, when I was not in my own head but lost somewhere centuries ago, I didn’t want to hurt this woman. I didn’t want to cause her pain and I didn’t want to damage one hair on her head.
“It’s all I know,” she said as a single tear dripped from her eye and landed on my wrist. It burned, promising punishment if I drew out another. “It’s all I know.”
Letting go, I stood up and watched as she fought for breath. She rubbed her neck where fingerprints lingered on her flesh, and she took steadying deep breaths. It wasn’t the first time she’d been choked. She knew how to recover quickly, bring her breathing back to a steady rhythm and settle the adrenaline coursing through her. I felt guilt for her; I felt guilty for triggering a memory that didn’t seem too far beyond the surface. I felt remorse for touching her.
I felt like a cad, and we’d found out nothing. I didn’t want to disrespect her, but I didn’t want to respect her, either. I felt a strange sense of nothingness that swung on a pendulum between fear and adoration. For a stranger. The blonde, alien-like stranger who terrified me more than any man with a weapon ever had.
“Would you like to stay?” I asked, reminding myself that she was a victim, not a criminal. She didn’t deserve to be here.
I wouldn’t allow her imprisonment. I had demanded it, and now I would free her from the shackles of Sector 2.
“Stay, sir?” Her voice was quiet, timid. It spun me back the other way, like there were a hundred different women inside her fighting for attention.
“Yes. Would you like to stay and work in Ashford House? I can arrange for you to be removed from the cell and shown to the quarters. You’ll be required to work around the house, and in return for accepting you into our home, you will work with Trace and his team, to see what your unconscious uncovers.”
“Trace?” she asked, blinking up at me with long fluttering eyelashes. “Not you?”
“No.”
“But-”
“No, Annabella. Trace will let you out shortly.”
I stepped back, keeping my eyes on her as I reached for the door to let myself out. She never moved from her spot on the bed in the corner of the cell. She’d barely flexed her legs the entire time I’d been there. I opened the door, stepped out and closed it behind me. Taking what felt like the first lungful of fresh oxygen since I’d stepped into Sector 2, I turned to the man guarding her door. Why he was there, I didn’t know. I’d felt like she’d needed extra protection, and I’d asked my cousin to deliver. As usual, he hadn’t disappointed.
“You’re not to talk to her unless Trace is present.”
“Understood, sir.”
I nodded and walked away, massaging the back of my neck. I needed a drink. I needed Trixie. I needed something other than this ridiculous puzzle that made me wonder if I’d ever been in control at all. I didn’t find Trace. I left the Sector, crossed the foyer of Ashford House, and headed straight outside to where Percy waited with the car. Pulling out my phone, I slid into the back and emailed my requests to Trace.
“Successful day, sir?” Percy asked.
I rolled my eyes. I was exhausted. Murder did that to a man. All I’d wanted to do was to save girls from a fate worse than death, and instead I’d taken another life.
“Good,” I said, remembering the one good thing I had done today. “I took a life, and I saved a life.”
“Then the balance is restored, sir. Home?”
I nodded, thinking of Trixie and hoping she’d be at home waiting for me. I wanted her in the living room, dressed in lounge clothes with her pink fluffy slipper-socks. I wanted her hair up in a messy knot on the back of her head, so I could free it and loosen her scalp with my fingertips. I wanted her happy. I wanted her comfortable. I wanted her to feel at home. Her home. My home. Our home.
Elias had asked me not to draw. He’d asked me to stay away from the easel. Technically, I had obeyed. I hadn’t touched the easel, but I had put pencil to paper. I hadn’t drawn; I’d planned. Art wasn’t just an escape, a way to release my frustrations and hide my desires…it gave me skills I would use while planning for our future. I could measure a distance with one eye closed and nothing but my pencil to draw to scale. I knew how many houses I could fit into an outer circle of the village. I knew I could add two more rings of houses. I knew there was space for several more villages on the grounds of the estate, and I knew there would still be land for grazing animals, crops and vegetables, a doctor’s surgery, a shop in each village, fresh running water…I knew we could rebuild London, but it would take more than transforming Blackwood Estate into a community within prison. I knew it would require man-power I didn’t have, and means of recruitment I didn’t possess. And Blackwood Estate wouldn’t be enough. We would need Ashford Estate, too. We would need Sectors 3 and 4, and while my instincts told me Trace would be open to at least discussing the idea of filtering the population—unlike my husband—I couldn’t be certain about Lawson and Beckett. Would they give their land up to save the innocent? Would they open the gates of their paradise to people who had been cast out for so long? And how would we know? What happened if we granted the underground access?
“Trixie?” I looked up from the concrete.
“Hey,” I said, as Elias joined me on the step that led down to the garden. “How was your day?”
“Good.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me into him to press a kiss on the top of my head. “Sorry I’m home so late.”
“I missed you.”
He nodded and kissed me again. “What are you doing? You’re covered in pencil shavings.”
I laughed and looked down at my sketchpad as I closed it, brushing the shavings off my lap and holding up my pencil, which was now no longer than a few inches.
“I know you told me not to draw, but I thought if it was architectural-”
“Architectural? Are you planning on changing careers?”
“I don’t have a career,” I answered, the sadness of how empty my life was, how few accomplishments I had, crept over me and made me shiver.
“You will. We just have to work out where.”
“I wanted to draw the villages.”
“Trix…” Elias sighed, dragging his hand through his hair and getting to his feet, taking me with him. “We’ve talked about this.”
“No we haven’t. You cut me off when I tried to.”
“Come on, I’m starving. Did you eat?”
He took my hand and I tucked my pad under my arm as I let him guide me into the conservatory and through the house to the dining hall. Lola had set out a feast fit for a king. She and the staff had placed platters of thinly-sliced meats and delicate cubes of cheese, trays filled with fresh fruit and bowls of salad vegetables; we had fresh bread, still steaming from being baked in the stone ovens in the village. We had jugs of salad dressing, plates of cakes, and decanters of wine and cordial. Elias sat at the head of the table and reached for my wrist when I moved to pass the sixteen seats to sit at the other end.
“Sit next to me, princess,” he said, giving me a gentle tug as he kicked a chair out and nodded for me to sit down. “I want to be close to you.”
“Who are you and what have you done with Elias?”
He chuckled and reached for a grape. He popped it into his mouth, and then began filling our plates with food. I had no idea what he was serving me; all I could do was watch him as he talked animatedly about where the meat had come from, how the presse was made in the village I’d been banned from, and how the wine had been made especially for him, because he liked the grape from a vineyard in France that was struggling under the weight of financial strain.
“…so I bought it.”
“What?” I shook my head, frowning when I could finally look away from the sparkle in his eyes and the mesmerising way his lips moved when he spoke. “Bought what?”
“The vineyard. I gave them a lump sum, and I send them money every year to stay open and send me bottles of my favourite fermented grape.”
“You bought a vineyard? In France?”
“Yes.” He nodded at my plate. “Eat up.”
I picked a grape, rolling it around my plate with a tiny fork until I could pin it, stab it, and pop it in my mouth. The white grape burst flavour and texture and sensation exploding in my mouth and temporarily distracting me from Elias as he poured the wine.
“You’ve visited this vineyard?”
“I was required to explore beyond the walls before I accepted my transition, yes. I told you, I’ll show you the world. I wouldn’t be able to do that if I hadn’t already seen it.”
I’d never felt the age gap between us until now. I’d never felt inferior. I’d never worried about our levels of experience because we were from the same world. But we weren’t. Elias had seen it. He’d bathed in the sea, he’d picked
grapes from vines in Burgundy—he’d tried to hide the label, but he couldn’t hide from me—and he’d done God knew what else, God knew where. How was I ever going to compete? How was I ever going to be his equal?
“Hey,” he said, pinching my chin gently. “Would it help if I confess that it pleases me to teach you?”
“It pleases you?”
He nodded, and raised his glass, looking at the red wine from all angles before pressing it to his lips. He cocked a brow for me to do the same and I followed, pressing the rim to my lips.
“It pleases me.” He flexed his eyebrows again, and looked at my glass. “Hold the stem, not the bowl.” Placing my glass back on the table, I took a gentle hold of the stem and resumed the position. “Good. I like the way your eyes pop when you discover something for the first time, like you did in the garden on your first night back on Ashford Estate after so long without it.” He sniffed the wine, his nose hovering above the glass like a helicopter as he took small, quick sniffs. I followed his lead, smelling my own helping. “I love the way your breath hitches and you try to hide the gasp of astonishment, like you did the first time I took you in the kitchen.” The memory slammed into me, and swirled around me with the wine that smelt of the earth, and fresh fruit. It sent my senses into overdrive and my eyes connected with Elias’. “What do you smell?”
“Leather,” I answered, taking another sniff. “Something earthy. It smells fresh and fruity, but I swear I can smell vanilla. Do you put vanilla in red wine?”
“The vanilla is from new oak barrels. It’s their signature, and what makes me so fond of this wine. The barrels are like painters’ palettes.”
“You made a painting reference.”
“I did.” He smiled. I smiled in return. “Are you ready to taste?”
I nodded. “Yes, please.”
The Uprising (GRIT Sector 1 Book 2) Page 21
