by Nikki Sloane
“Or you can fight.” His eyes were hard. “That doesn’t end well, and I don’t want that.”
“Why?” I whispered.
“Because,” he said, annoyed, although it seemed self-directed. “Because I fucking like you, all right? I have for a while.” The muscles in his fingers tensed, clamping on my jaw. “You’re perfect.”
“I’m not.”
“Shut the fuck up. You’re perfect for me.” He slammed his lips over mine in a harsh kiss. “So choose.”
My choice was to live under Luka’s thumb, or not at all? What kind of choice was that? And I couldn’t run, could I? Luka’s father had threatened my family. He’d said he’d find me, and even if he didn’t, I’d have to throw my whole life away. Everything I’d worked for would be gone.
Luka’s whisper wasn’t a request. It was spoken softly, but filled with so much command, it rang loud in my ears. “Pick me.”
“Over death?” I closed my eyes in a long blink, and a rogue tear slipped out. I moved quickly to brush it off, horrified, but he beat me to it. His thumb swept over my cheekbone, smearing it away. He’d changed the course of my entire life with one thoughtless act. Did he realize? “You took everything from me last night.”
“I know.” His eyes were honest. “I had to have you, and I wasn’t thinking about anything else.”
I noticed it wasn’t an apology. If he could do it all over again, he still would. He lowered to kneel by the edge of the bed, bringing our gazes level. There was nowhere else I could look but at those intense, deep eyes. Maybe I could take some comfort in the fact that his life had changed, too. He was saddled with me now, at least until his father ordered him to kill me. Then he’d have to carry the weight of my death forever.
“I’m not going to be easy for you,” he said. “As much as I try not to be, I’m like my father. Most of the time I don’t give a fuck about feelings, and I expect you’ll hate me like I hate him.” His voice was weirdly hypnotic. “But your hate will fade until you can learn to live with it. You won’t even notice it after a while.”
I gave him a wary look, conveying how unpersuasive his sales pitch was.
“Maybe,” he continued undeterred, “one day it’ll change from hate into something . . . different. We got a hint earlier of what you and I could be like together.” His lips met mine, brushing in the briefest of kisses. “Just a taste.” His teasing mouth lingered a breath away. “I want more. You can tell me you don’t, but I said no lies.” His eyes darkened from a flat black to a rich, layered one. “I can give you anything you want, including your freedom.”
The familiar tremble he caused in me was back, shaking my foundation. I needed to know who I was surrendering to, and my voice was a ghost. “Have you ever killed someone?”
“No.”
I blew out a long breath.
His emotionless mask cracked and darkness seeped out at the edges. “I came very, very close once.”
It was clear he wasn’t talking about our episode in the bathtub. The temperature in the room plummeted and goosebumps pebbled on my bare arms. “I’m going to be a doctor. I want to save lives, not take them. I can’t be with someone who could do that.”
The air swirled around us and thickened as he considered my statement. His voice was sharp. “I haven’t, but the world’s not all black and white.”
“And I’m not halfway in love with you,” I blurted out. “What you did at dinner—”
“Was to save your fucking life. One word from my father and Michael would’ve been standing behind you with his gun. You’d have been dead before your head hit the table.”
It was surely true, but I couldn’t deal with the reality this was my life now. Yesterday my biggest worry was if I’d secured enough scholarships. Today it was whether or not I’d survive the night.
He didn’t appear to be lying to me. His pupils weren’t large and his breathing was steady. Had his actions really been to prevent my death as he claimed?
“I’ll never love you,” I said.
A tiny voice whispered in my head, telling me I’d just given Luka a challenge, and I’d done it on purpose. The sick part of me wanted him to rise to meet it. And when his eyes flared with interest and the side of his mouth tugged up, I knew I’d made a terrible mistake.
“Yeah? We’ll see.”
14
LUKA WAS SUMMONED back downstairs, and left me alone in the room, stating he’d be back in a minute. Obviously this was a test. If I ran, I’d made my choice. A bullet from his father’s bodyguard would end it, and no one would know what happened to the smart, yet abrasive Addison Drake.
If I stayed in the room, he’d return and assume I’d also made my choice, picking him.
Not that there was a choice to be had, but I struggled against it. I needed time and space. I was angry. So goddamn angry, I wanted to pull my teeth out. He deserved to feel that same anger. I needed him to understand.
What I’d said to him was true. I wanted to save lives. I’d spoken candidly with Dr. Gupta once, and he’d talked about the kick after leaving the OR, knowing he’d just completed a successful surgery. It was powerful holding someone’s fate in your hands, and the feeling was addictive. Was that how I was to Luka? Was he high off of controlling my life?
Like a tumor that was slowly killing a patient, I want to excise the bad part of him. I needed a weapon. Something small he wouldn’t see coming until it was too late. Something small, and sharp.
There was nothing under the bathroom sinks except for paper products. My razor was suspiciously missing from my shower supplies. The only artwork on the wall was a canvas, so there was no glass to break. I stared at the huge mirror in the bathroom. He’d hear me break it, and could be on me before I could get a shard free to wield.
There was a table lamp on one of the dressers. I unplugged it and hurried to the bathroom, grabbing a towel. I then set it over the lightbulb and unscrewed, twisting quickly and trying not to burn my fingertips on the hot glass.
I had to hurry. He could be back any second. I wrapped the lightbulb up in the towel, rolled it in the rug in the bathroom, and wacked it against the tile. Just hard enough to hear the glass break, but not loud enough to draw suspicion.
My heart fell when I unrolled the rug and discovered most pieces weren’t useable. They were too small or rounded. There was only one that had a point on it, and it was the size of a postage stamp. It’d have to do. I cleaned up the mess quietly and efficiently, grasped the fragile piece of glass between my fingers, then went into the bedroom to wait.
The glass wouldn’t cut deep. It wouldn’t do much of anything but piss him off, and logic told me it was a bad idea, but my emotions overruled it. Luka needed to feel at least a fraction of what I felt. I wanted to see him bleed.
Heavy footsteps approached the door, and my heart pounded. I urged my hand to stay steady. If I tensed too much, I could crack the glass further and have nothing. The door swung open. Luka stepped in, shut it behind him, and looked satisfied I seemingly hadn’t moved from my spot sitting on the bed.
His hand darted behind his back, and when it reappeared, it gripped a gun. I held my breath. Well, if that wasn’t us perfectly. Me, a tiny piece of fragile glass, compared to him, an experienced, strong weapon. I could only maim, whereas he could do so much more damage.
He dropped the gun on the dresser and for a single moment looked relieved the weight of it was gone from his hand.
“My father,” he said, gesturing to it. “He wants you to pick this.” Luka’s gaze sharpened on me. “But you’re still here.”
“Yes,” I whispered. I’d have to lure him away from the gun.
“Stand up.”
I climbed to my feet, concealing the scrap of glass in the folds of my skirt. Oh, Luka looked thrilled. His half smile reached all the way to his eyes. He strode rapidly to me, each footstep exponentially increasing my anxiety. What if he discovered the glass before I got to use it? What if he picked up the gun after?
The half-smile spread wide and engulfed his face with a beautiful evil. “I’m counting on it.”
His reaction only strengthened my desire to show him pain. “I’ll hurt you.”
“Yeah?” He licked his lips, either preparing to kiss me or devour me like the big bad wolf. “You can’t hurt me.”
He brought my face to his and when his tongue shoved past my lips, I made my move. I set the pointed edge against his forearm and slashed down the length of it.
“The fuck?” He shoved me away as he hissed in pain, staring in surprise at the angry red streak on his skin. It wasn’t even a cut. It was more of a scratch, although I had drawn a little blood. Red began to blossom and seep from the center of the scrape.
Only I’d pressed too hard, and the glass splintered, cutting into my fingertips.
He snatched my hand up, painfully bending my palm back until I released the tiny bits of glass. “Where’d that come from?”
I whimpered in pain. Blood streaked down my finger and the cut throbbed. “The lamp. I broke a lightbulb.”
He looked, of all things, confused. “You could have used that to go for the gun. Why didn’t you?”
“Because I made my choice and there’s no point in running. Even if I knew how to get it to fire,” because I assumed it had some sort of safety lock, “I wouldn’t use it.” I glared at him with defiance. “I don’t want to kill you, but I do want to see you bleed.”
He stared at me with disbelief, and then something scary flickered in his eyes. “Yeah, well, we’re both bleeding now.” His grip increased pressure, and I yelped. “Happy?”
The ache spiraled up my arm, but I shoved the pain away. “Yeah, I’m fucking thrilled.”
He could move so fast. His hand lashed out and gripped my throat, shoving me along. He backed me up until the dresser dug into my spine, and I wrapped my bloodied hand around his forearm. It smeared our blood together, which seemed fitting. A deal forged in blood, started when he’d made me bleed last night.
He pressed me so hard into the dresser, I knew the fancy drawer pulls were going to leave bruises on my body. I needed relief and unleashed a slap across his face. It probably hurt me more than him, since his cheekbone was hard as a rock, but his eyebrow rose up and his skin flushed pink.
Fury burned in his eyes.
He released me so he could pick up the gun. I was thrown across the room and hurtled into the wall, getting a face full of green wallpaper. I stopped moving, or breathing, or thinking, when Luka pinned my hand to the smooth paper with the barrel of his gun. It was the same hand I’d slapped him with.
“How successful of a surgeon can you be with one hand?” he snarled. “Do that again and you’ll find out.”
The gun drew away, and was probably tucked back in the waistband of his pants where it had been when he’d come into the room. I stood stock still as his fingers found the pull on the zipper at the back of my dress. He tugged it down, and as soon the dress was open, his hand dove inside and undid the clasp of my bra.
“You’ve lost the privilege of clothes.” He clenched a handful of the dress by my shoulder and jerked down aggressively. “Off.”
I complied immediately. I’d known there’d be retaliation, and had already accepted it. The dress and bra fell away from my body and I stepped backward out of them.
“Go into the bathroom and wash your hand.”
I didn’t look at him or myself in the mirror. I performed the task and ran the cold tap over my sliced fingers. They’d stopped bleeding, at least.
“Is there any glass in the cut?” He asked it, but then checked for himself. He held my wounded hand up in the light and examined. I stared at his arm. The scratch had barely bled at all. Luka seemed satisfied and marched me back into the bedroom.
His command made me go boneless. “Get on your knees.”
He wouldn’t kill me, I reminded myself. He’d have done it already. He also wouldn’t have examined my cut for glass if he was about to perform an execution. I knelt on the carpet, sat back on my heels, and wrapped my arms around myself.
Luka carefully picked up the bits of glass and tossed them into the wastebasket with a soft clink. Then he lifted the black duffel bag up and set it on the loveseat, searching through it.
He found whatever it was he was looking for. It was a thick, black leather circle, and the thin metal chain attached gleamed in the soft light. There was a leather loop at the end, signifying what this was, and my stomach turned.
A collar and leash.
“I expected you to try something,” Luka said, as he worked to undo the buckle. “I’m not angry, but your behavior is not acceptable.”
I dug my fingers into my arms, strengthening myself to stay still. The only part of me that moved as the collar descended around my throat was my rapidly heaving chest. The leather was thick and cold, covering two inches of my neck.
“Lift your hair.”
I scooped it up and held it out of his way as Luka buckled the oppressive collar. It wasn’t too tight, but it wasn’t physically comfortable either. When it was done, the long metal chain hung down my bare back, swinging slightly and the cold metal kissed my skin.
Luka dangled something in front of me. A small combination lock.
“This has four dials on it,” he said. “Each with ten numbers including the zero. How many possible combinations does it have?”
My heart sank. “Ten thousand.”
It clicked into place at the base of my neck, locking the collar on me. His firm hand dipped under my arm and hauled me to my feet, then shoved me toward the bed. “Lie down.”
Once again, I followed his orders. I’d drawn blood from him, albeit less than I wanted to, so I’d achieved my goal. Now the adrenaline was fading and I was exhausted both physically and emotionally. I lay down on the sheets, staring blankly at the ceiling and expecting him to climb on top of me.
He didn’t.
Another combination lock was held in front of my eyes, showing me ten thousand more numbers I wouldn’t guess. The leash was run through the headboard cutout, and the top of the lock threaded through the leather loop and a link of chain. That left me with five feet of slack. I could get off the bed, but that was the limit of my range.
I peered up at him, fearful, but his expression was blank. He glanced down my body and back up again, giving me no hint of what he was thinking.
“Good night, Addison.”
Then he went to the door, turned off the lights, and left.
π
I woke with a start. It was morning, and the smell of coffee lingered in the room. I turned my head to find Luka sitting on the same loveseat as yesterday. He wore jeans and a navy blue v-neck, his fingers casually wrapped around the handle of a mug while he stared at his phone.
My movement drew his attention.
“Morning. I thought you were going to waste the whole day.”
I’d pulled the covers over me last night after he’d left, and I held them to me as I sat up. “I had a hard time falling asleep last night without your drugs.”
He set his coffee down on the floor, stood, and strolled casually toward the bed. His relaxed posture set me on edge. He’d clearly regrouped last night, whereas I’d fought to hold it together. I’d tried different combinations in a futile attempt to get free, starting of course with pi, but nothing worked on either lock. So after that, I’d shifted into seeing if I could break the bed frame to get free, which had also been futile. There was nothing within reach of the bed that would help me escape.
There wasn’t a clock in the room, but it was probably the middle of the night when I’d come to the realization that my best hope for freedom was to do exactly as Luka said. I’d quietly cried myself to sleep.
His hand covered the lock around the end of the leash and freed me. “Use the restroom and come right bac
k.”
I did. I told myself I no longer cared about being naked. He’d seen me plenty by now. When I came back into the bedroom, he pointed to the bed. I lay down and said nothing. At least the choker last night gave me use of my hands and allowed me to sleep on my side if I wanted. He took the leash in a hand. It was slack and he was simply holding it, but I was incredibly aware of the control.
There was a loud ticking I picked up on then. A large, round alarm clock with hands on the face sat on the nightstand. Luka must have put it there when I was in the bathroom.
“This clock,” he said, “is going to help teach you.” He sat beside me and the mattress sank with his weight, causing me to roll into him. “When the second hand hits zero, you’ll watch it and count each second in your head.”
The thin hand ticked up the clock, heading toward the twelve. I studied it attentively as the new minute began. One. Two. Three.
I blinked and forced my mind not to wander as it ticked along. By fifty seconds it was a struggle. As it climbed back to one, Luka’s single word shattered my focus. “Again.”
One. Two. Three.
The exercise went on, three more rounds of it. Somewhere in minute five, he spoke. “Count out loud.”
“Thirty-six,” I said. “Thirty-seven. Thirty-eight.”
“Stop and look at me.” His face was stoic. “What is this lesson?”
I inhaled. “That my time is your time.”
He teased a smile. “So fucking smart.”
There was a sharp click as he snapped his fingers and I swallowed thickly. I hesitantly spread my legs open, ignoring the unease channeling through me. First, his gaze scored down my bare flesh. Over the tops of my breast, along my belly, and down to my hips where I was totally exposed. Then, his hands, even the one holding the end of the leash, followed the path of his gaze.
His hands were warm as he caressed me. His touch was gentle and almost loving, but I told myself I didn’t like this. I flinched when his fingers traced a line at the hollow where my leg met my body. It both tickled, and made the muscles low in my belly clench. I knew where this was going and a dark hunger growled in me.
