Depraved men, it seemed, were becoming a specialty of mine.
I’d been provided with towels, though they were small, I assumed so I wouldn’t also try to use them to strangle myself with. Still, they were big enough to hide my torso from any prying eyes, and when I turned on the shower, the small space quickly filled with steam. Surely the steam would help to fog up the cameras? The outside plastic of the shower screen also began to fog, and a small part of me relaxed. Though I felt vulnerable being naked, I was starting to think this was a good way to get a little privacy. I was acutely aware that I was being watched one hundred percent of the time, and the bed was a box-spring base, so I couldn’t even crawl under that to hide, or slip right beneath the sheets, as he hadn’t provided me with any. The idea of not being seen, just for a little while, appealed to me. Perhaps I could use this to my advantage sometime? I still hadn’t given up on the idea of perhaps being able to create a weapon of some kind from the plastic cutlery I ate with. If I needed some cover to fashion it into a weapon, this would certainly be an option. Of course, I hadn’t managed to get my hands on a piece of plastic cutlery yet—Loretta had made sure I always put it back on the tray—but I figured time was on my side. I also now knew that Loretta was armed, and I would be ready for her when the time came.
Assuming they didn’t kill me first.
I did my best to push the negative thoughts out of my head and focus on the shower instead. The room was filled with steam now, but still I hesitated, before quickly shrugging out of my jeans then undoing the top buttons of my shirt and yanking it over my head. Clutching the small towel against my body, I pushed off my filthy underwear and did the same for my bra. I looked down at my pile of stinking, filthy clothes. I remembered dressing in that shirt, agonizing over what to wear, hoping I looked smart, without appearing aggressive. I almost snorted out laughter at the thought. Who cared what I dressed like? The choice of my shirt didn’t make this happen to me. I probably could have been wearing a bag over my head, and I still would have ended up kidnapped—hell, the bag would have saved my kidnapper a job. And yet it had seemed so important only a few days ago, and now it was no more than a filthy rag on the floor.
With a sigh and fighting the internal weight that was suddenly trying to drag me down, I turned to the shower. Stepping beneath the stream of water, I leaned out and hooked the towel over the metal bar attached to the outside of the shower screen. As the water ran down over my shoulders, I let out another sigh, but for a different reason this time. The hot water felt blissful on my skin, and my eyes slipped shut as I tilted my chin up and let the flow pummel the top of my head. I’d never appreciated how good a shower felt. The water thrummed against my aching muscles and carried the grime from my hair and body into the small drain below. Wanting the clean scent of soap, I picked up the bar and lathered it over my body, into my armpits, under my breasts, between my legs. The air was filled with hot, steamy fragrance and I looked forward to slipping into something clean after I’d dried off. I rinsed off the soap and lathered myself up again for good measure. Then I squirted some shampoo out of the bottle into my palm and soaped my hair before rinsing and applying conditioner. There was even a soft bristled brush to work out the tangles as my hair ran slippery as seaweed beneath the water.
I didn’t want to get out, but Loretta would be bringing breakfast down to me soon, and I didn’t want her to find me in here. It wasn’t as though the older woman hadn’t seen it all before, but I didn’t like her, and she definitely didn’t like me, so I didn’t want to be naked and vulnerable in the same space as her. She might decide to Taser me again, and I didn’t much like the idea of being locked in a spasm on the floor, nude and soaking wet.
Reluctantly, I rinsed the last of the conditioner and soap from my hair and body respectively, and then switched off the water. I reached for the towel I’d left hanging on the bar attached to the shower screen door and quickly used it to hide my body. There was no door on the bathroom—something that had taken a little getting used to when it came to using the toilet, and I’d definitely suffered from stage fright on the first few attempts—so the steam quickly escaped, exposing me to the cameras. I wished I’d thought to grab some of the clean clothes and bring them into the bathroom with me, so avoiding the awkward little scurry I was now going to do to reach the dresser in only the tiny towel.
I left the bathroom, the towel wrapped around my torso, and made my way into the living area of the room, to where the dresser was located.
Stopping short, my stomach lurched. “You have got to be fucking kidding me.”
I hadn’t seen him for almost two days, and yet there he was, Hayden, standing in the middle of the room.
Scowling at him, I snapped, “Have you got any idea how inappropriate this is?”
He didn’t take his eyes off me. “I didn’t know you were in the shower.”
I didn’t believe him for a second. “No? Then how come you didn’t see the steam on your cameras?”
“I haven’t been watching them.”
“What?” I’d heard what he’d said, but I didn’t believe him for a second.
“I haven’t been watching them. They got a little... addictive.”
My eyes widened. “Addictive.” Jesus, what a creep. “Y0u felt addicted to watching me?”
He nodded. “And thinking about you. And wanting to come down here and spend time with you.”
“Are you trying to freak me out, because I promise you, it’s working. And considering you kidnapped me, making me think you’re even creepier than I first gave you credit for is actually kind of impressive.” I wasn’t trying to pay him a compliment.
He shook his head and finally glanced away. I allowed myself a slow, shaky exhale. I’d been caught in the intensity of his gaze, frozen in one spot, terrified to move. My bravado was a defense mechanism when what I really wanted to do was run crying and screaming back into the bathroom. I’d have shut myself in there, putting a door between the two of us, except there wasn’t one.
His lips tightened. “I didn’t mean it to sound like that.” He swallowed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “I was trying to do the right thing by staying away.”
I arched my eyebrows. “The right thing? The right thing would be to let me get dressed and then put me on that plane of yours—untied, this time—and take me home.”
“I can’t do that.”
“You can’t, or you won’t?”
“Something has been started now, and I have to see it through.”
“What thing? Some deal you made in prison?” I narrowed my eyes at him, trying to work him out.
Lines appeared between his thick eyebrows, and he narrowed his eyes back at me. “Prison? No. I’ve never been to prison.”
Should I believe him? Maybe I’d been wrong when I’d thought he wasn’t taking orders from someone else. He must be the one being paid by whoever was either still behind bars with my father, or who had been. I wasn’t about to get caught up in the details. “Fine, then—whenever the person you work for had been in prison.”
He shook his head. “That isn’t what this is about, Jolie. You think this is a little gang payback or something?”
“What else would it be?”
I was horribly conscious that I was standing in only a towel in front of this handsome but dangerous man, but he was talking, and that was far preferable to the silence I’d been dealing with for the past forty-eight hours. Plus, I was getting answers out of him, or at least I hoped I was.
“You took a photograph of me to send to my father in prison. What else am I supposed to think?”
“You’re right, but actually it doesn’t matter what you think. You’ll find out in time, when I’m ready to tell you.”
“Tell me now,” I demanded.
“I don’t think you’re in any position to tell me what to do.” His gaze flicked down my body, lingering where my breasts were threatening to burst from the top of the towel, before dropping lower,
across my naked thighs. To my horror, my body responded to the weight of his gaze, my nipples crinkling beneath the towel, and a throb of arousal condensing low in my core.
My breath caught, and I clutched the towel closer, unsure what to do. If I made a sudden move, I was certain he’d lunge for me and make sure I no longer had the protection of a crappy little towel.
Chapter Thirteen
I should never have come down here.
I should have been stronger.
Now I was standing in front of her, her wet hair dripping down her naked shoulders, her skin pink and clean from the shower, and she was looking at me as though she could read exactly what was going through my mind.
It had been a mistake, but now that I was down here I couldn’t bring myself to turn around and catch the elevator back up. We were trapped in this strange little bubble, and the tension fizzing between us kept me rooted to the spot. She was like a magnet to my iron, and no matter how much I wanted to pull away, she drew me in.
Though I’d told her she didn’t need to know what my plans were, I found the words tripping off my tongue anyway. Did I want her to be an accomplice to my plans rather than an unwilling victim?
“Your photograph will have been sent by now,” I told her. “It’ll have to go through the necessary checks, but there’s no reason it won’t be passed on to your father. When he tries to contact you, someone will let him know that you went missing several days ago, and that’s when he’ll realize you’ve been taken, assuming he’s not been informed already.”
She stared at me. “Why are you doing this?”
“Like I said, revenge.”
Her gaze flicked across my face, baffled. “Revenge for what?”
Her reply burst cold laughter from my lungs. Was she stupid, or playing with me? “You really have to ask me that question?”
“He did something to you,” she replied, grasping at straws, “or someone you love.”
Hurt must have flickered across my features, as she straightened, seeing she was onto something. “Someone you love, is that it? Someone you love who is in prison?” The pitch of her voice rose at the end in a curious question.
I understood why she kept going back to the prison thing. Ten years had passed since it had all happened—almost half her lifetime. I’d only been five years older than her back then, but I’d definitely left childhood behind me at that point and was becoming a man, where she’d still been very much a kid. Maybe the idea that someone could wait and plan all that time was foreign to her.
“He took something from me, and now I’ve taken something from him.”
Her features tightened. “You haven’t taken anything from him,” she snapped. “I’m not his. I haven’t been for a long time. I doubt he gives a fuck about me, so whatever you’re doing here won’t work. I expect he’s forgotten he even has a daughter. He certainly didn’t give a shit about me when I was a child.”
“We both know that’s not true. He loved you, and you loved him, otherwise you wouldn’t have done what you did.”
She stared at me again. “What I did?”
I hadn’t meant to say that. If she realized punishing her father wasn’t the only reason I’d brought her here, and that she deserved punishing of her own, she might not be so cooperative.
“Forget it.”
She stepped forward, still clutching the towel. “No, tell me what you mean!”
I ignored her. “I brought your breakfast down. Eat it, or don’t. I don’t really care.”
But she took several steps to the side, blocking my exit. “Tell me.”
I scowled at her. “Get out of my way, Jolie.”
“Or what? Are you going to electrocute me like your housemaid did?”
She was starting to piss me off. “I can do far worse than that to you, and I think you know it.” I took a step forward, reminding myself who I was. I needed to remember who she was, too. She didn’t deserve any of my sympathy, even though she somehow eked it out of me.
Instead of backing away, she took a frustratingly determined step forward, closing the gap between us further. “Worse than kidnapping me?”
“I’ve been kind to you so far,” I growled, “but that can always change.”
Her eyebrows shot up her forehead. “Kind?” She risked releasing the towel with one hand to gesture around her. “You call this kind?”
My line of sight fixed on the healing graze on her cheek. “I might be keeping you against your will, but have I hurt you? Have I hit you even once?”
“You grabbed me and threw me into the trunk of a car. Not all violence needs to be hitting.”
She had a point, but I wasn’t going to agree with her.
“That doesn’t mean I’m not capable of violence, Jolie. Just because I’ve been nice up until now doesn’t mean I’m not willing to put you down if you’re asking for it.”
“That’s how all you men think, isn’t it,” she spat, fury darkening her blue eyes. “That we’re asking for it. It doesn’t matter what you’ve done to us in the buildup, or how badly we’ve been treated or wronged, if a woman doesn’t act exactly how you want her to act, then she’s asking to be put in her place.”
I wasn’t going to let her get away with it. “And some women deserved to be punished,” I growled. “Some women do the most heinous of things and walk away from it because they’re female and people automatically think she’s the victim and take pity on her.”
My feet must have moved, though I wasn’t aware of consciously taking any steps, as suddenly there was barely any space between us and she was glaring up at me as much as I was glaring down at her. She appeared to have forgotten she was practically naked, but I hadn’t. From this position, I had the perfect view of the swell of her creamy tits, and I forced myself to clench my fists at my side to stop myself from yanking the towel away and throwing it to the floor. This was the daughter of my enemy, and if I didn’t hate her as much as I did, I’d be tempted to fuck her just to get my revenge on him. In fact, my cock thought this was an excellent idea, and strained against the front of my pants as though trying to cross the small amount of space left between us. I would have loved to shove my hand up under that towel, to force her legs apart and push my fingers into her tight little pussy, but I may have been a lot of things, but I wasn’t a rapist.
That didn’t stop me thinking about it, though.
Something about either my words or my stance must have made her realize I meant business. Her shoulders slumped, her chin went down, and she stepped out of the way. She still had hold of that damned little towel, and I wished I could will it from her body. I could easily have snatched it off her and gotten a good eyeful to last me through the rest of the day, but if I wanted to see a woman’s body, she was either going to show it to me willingly, or I wasn’t going to get to see it at all.
For the first time, I started to wonder how I was going to get her naked willingly.
Fuck, no. This was the exact reason I shouldn’t have come down here. I did not want this woman. She was here to be punished, not fawned over. She was my enemy as much as he was, even if she didn’t realize it yet.
“Get dressed and eat your breakfast,” I snapped at her, as though she was a child I was trying to get ready for school instead of a grown woman I was holding captive beneath my house.
I couldn’t bring myself to look at her again, knowing I was holding on to the final threads of my self-control as it was. If she said the wrong thing, or looked at me the wrong way, I didn’t trust how I would react.
The elevator felt as though it took forever, but finally the doors slid apart and I stepped inside. Only when they shut behind me again did I allow myself to blow out a breath. What the fuck had that been all about? The sexual tension in that room had been thick enough to see, and I didn’t think it had all come from me, either. She’d made no mention of me letting her get dressed and instead had moved closer to me rather than away, the whole while clutching that stupid little towel between h
er breasts. Had that been her plan all along? Did she figure she’d use sex to get what she wanted—her freedom? Maybe she thought she could mess with my mind enough to make me fall in love with her and want to set her free. I should expect her to be manipulative. After all, wasn’t that exactly what her father had done? He’d used his good looks and charm to make women believe he could be trusted, when that was the very last thing she should be doing. Was his daughter exactly the same?
Of course, she was. I didn’t know why I was even questioning it.
That was the exact reason I was able to justify what I’d done in kidnapping her and bringing her here. She was her father’s daughter.
I would try to leave her alone, at least until the time came to take the next step. I’d promised myself the same thing last time and had gone back on my word, but I had to be stronger. Of course, I would need to be involved at certain points to make sure I got what I needed, but no more making excuses to myself to go down and see her. That could be dangerous in the long run. I didn’t know if she was deliberately trying to get under my skin, but she was.
I’d never had the problem of how to fill my days before. I would start my day with a swim, followed by breakfast, and then work for several hours. Loretta would bring me lunch, which I’d eat at my desk, and when I found my concentration waning by mid-afternoon, I would wake myself up with either another swim or a stint in my personal gym, or a quick hike around the island. The evening would either be more work, or else a movie, or occasionally a crime novel. Each day would be much the same, regardless of whether it was the week or the weekend. Work did take me away from the island, but it was something I avoided if possible. I wasn’t fond of people, and the cities where most finance business took place were full of them. I was far more comfortable here, mostly alone, except for the couple of individuals on my payroll, who knew I wasn’t interested in small talk or company.
Shattered Hearts: A Dark Romance (Bad Blood Book 1) Page 8
