I can hear her crying softly through the oak door, the one I broke open months ago for very different reasons. I knock on the door, firmly but not violently. No response. She must be so deep in the nightmare that she can’t hear me. I try the knob, prepared to kick my way past the lock again, but it opens easily for me. She must have given up on even the facade of privacy.
I let myself in, approaching the girl on the bed. She’s twisting in the sheets, face pale and sweaty, tiny moans emerging from slightly parted lips. Fuck. I really am the devil, for what this image is doing in my head, and between my legs. I’ve crossed a lot of lines with my pretty captive, but standing over her as she sleeps feels like a new one. And crawling into bed with her? We’re leaving that line far behind right now, too.
I don’t know how to stop her misery, but I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to wake someone from a nightmare. I can’t just stand by and let her cry for yet another night, though. Maybe it’s an animal instinct to protect what is mine, even if the enemy is purely mental. Maybe I’m just grasping for an excuse to do what I’ve been craving for years.
So I wrap her up in my arms, keeping the covers between us. It’s not because I’m trying to be a gentleman, but rather the opposite. As is, it’s a struggle to keep my raging hard-on at bay even with layers of silk and linen between us. If her lithe body was directly against my flesh, nothing but that damn lace nightie of hers and my boxers between us, well, there would be no controlling myself.
Selina stirs a bit at my touch, but settles into my grip easily. In a few minutes her breathing begins to even out, and soon she is back in a silent sleep, her unconscious body nestling further into mine.
And so, years after claiming her, months after taking her, and days after marrying her, I spend the night with Selina Palacios for the very first time.
I wake up feeling safer than I have in months.
Safer, warmer, and thoroughly suspicious. Is it possible to feel protected and uneasy at the same time?
My eyes blink open slowly, but it takes me a beat longer than it should to realize what is happening. When I recognize the feeling of thick, masculine arms around me, I jolt fully awake, jerking away from the unfamiliar grasp.
“Princesa,” Vega groans, still half asleep, the only way I could slip past those solid biceps.
“What are you doing in my bed?” I say, voice laden with accusation, but what I really want to know is how I could not have noticed until now. How long have I been wrapped up in his arms? Has this happened before, and I just haven’t ever woken up in time to catch him? Is it possible that he could have done something to me in the night without waking me? But no, I don’t feel anything unusual between my legs as I sit, grabbing the sheets up around me in a belated attempt at modesty. Well, I don’t feel anything but the warmth that floods my center now, a natural reaction to the sight of the supremely fit shirtless man in my bed. My body doesn’t care what our history is, what he has done to my mind and soul. It only remembers the way he made me cum in the bathroom that night.
“You were having a nightmare,” Vega mumbles, slinging an arm over his eyes as if to shield himself from the sunlight flooding the room. His voice is thick with sleep, and like this, with his hair falling into his face and all those lethal muscles relaxed, he looks more boyish than a predator like him ever should. It’s almost… cute?
“That explains nothing,” I say, climbing out of bed, still wrapped up in silk sheets. It’s not like he hasn’t seen me in my nightie, on that first night they took over my home. Hell, this man has been inside me. I can’t explain why I suddenly feel shy, but his uninvited presence in my bed has turned me into a stammering school girl. “I’ve had nightmares for half a decade. I can survive them without you sneaking into my fucking bed like some kind of pervert.”
“Can you, princess?” Vega asks, and suddenly his voice isn’t soft and sleepy anymore, it’s sultry and demanding. I turn to look at him, and he’s propped up on his elbow in my bed, covers dipping dangerously low on his hips. Why can’t I stop willing the covers to fall away completely? Why can’t I stop remembering how good his arms felt around me? “Because you shut up pretty damn quick last night, after I took you into my arms.”
I say nothing, turning away again. I scamper into my walk-in closet, where I pull on a pair of leggings and a t-shirt as fast as I can.
“Can you please leave me alone?” I ask, when I find him still lounging in bed upon my I return. I know better than to make demands of my jailer, my blackmailer, my husband, but I don’t know how to convince my mouth of that.
“I think your body knows what your mind refuses to acknowledge,” Vega goes on, ignoring my request. I try to look away, but I’m captive to the intensity in his eyes, to the way he strips me down to my very core with nothing but a look. “That you belong to me.”
“My mind knows that all too well, thank you very much,” I snap, whipping my left hand up as evidence. The diamond he gave me the night of my catastrophically failed escape attempt weighs heavy on my finger, not so much a ring as a very expensive shackle. “That doesn’t mean you get to sneak into my bed when I’m sleeping.”
“Would you prefer that I come into your bed when you’re awake?” Vega says. We are relentless forces, the both of us, hail against pavement. I shatter against him every time, no matter how much speed I pick up along the way. “I know you think about it, too, Selina. When you cry out at night, it’s not always a nightmare that haunts you.”
I turn away to hide my blush, pretending to focus on brushing my hair up into a ponytail. I’ve always been convinced that at least he didn’t have cameras in my bedroom, but what if he does? How else could he know of the nights I spend lulling myself to sleep with a vibrator and a memory? Of course, there is also the fact that he said he knows I think about that night, too. But that thought only causes more anxiety.
“Fuck off, Vega,” I say, bravado exacerbated by the fact that he’s still tucked away in bed, too far to reach me with a punishing grasp for such a remark. “You’ve already won. You got my money, my legacy, my life. What more do you want from me?”
Then I walk out of my bedroom, the last safe haven I had in this house, now corrupted, before he has a chance to respond to that question. I know that I won’t like the answer.
I force the memory of waking in my captor’s arms out of my head and get to work. Now that I’m to be married—or rather, already married—my workload has seemingly doubled. Mother always said that marriage was a chore, but I’m not sure if this was what she meant. On top of my usual tasks, taking care of the house and feeding my wardens, I now am expected to plan the wedding I have no desire to be a part of. Vega really should have planned it himself, considering that he’s the one with all the opinions. He wants it at the Cathedral of St. Phillips, and the reception at the Biltmore ballrooms. He has no family or friends to invite, but does provide a long list of Atlanta’s elite that he wishes to see there. His most confusing request is more of a demand: the wedding needs to be front page news, getting us as much press as possible. It was less than a month ago that a blurry photo of him getting out to the public sent this man and his team into overdrive. Now, he is asking for the publicity? Every time I think I’ve learned the rules, he changes the game. It’s enough to drive a girl crazy—assuming she was somehow still sane after the kidnapping, murders, and blackmail proposal, anyway. I’m not sure I am, especially considering the way my heart sped up and my panties dampened at Javier’s touch this morning.
It should be of no surprise that my desires are twisted, nonsensical even to me. I started with daddy issues and picked up quite a bit more baggage along the way. Still, there’s no explanation for the way I feel now, no matter how deep a shrink might dig. It’s dark, and sick, and something I would rather forget about. Waking up in Javier’s arms makes that task difficult.
“Selina, what are you doing?”
I glance up from the pot I was scrubbing to find Kate standing behind me. In all the
drama of this morning, I’d forgotten about her return. My belly bubbles first with excitement and relief, then with worry. I’m happy she’s back, of course, but now I have to live in a whole new dimension of lies.
“I thought that other woman was your new housekeeper,” Kate is saying, brow furrowed. “With the crazy hair.”
I almost laugh at the thought of Miel cleaning up messes instead of making them, but focus on scrambling for an explanation. To Kate, the sight of me doing dishes is as absurd as the action once was to me.
“Um, no,” I say, setting the half-done pot down and grabbing a dish towel to dry my hands. “She’s one of Ve— one of Javier’s people. I… I didn’t have the heart to find a replacement for you, so I’ve just been doing all that shi— all that stuff myself now.”
Kate tsks, just like my mother would have if she’d caught me doing the maid’s job, and elbows me out of the way, reaching for the scrub brush herself. I let her, unsure of how else to react.
“Nonsense,” Kate says. “Girls like you don’t do dishes. Keep those hands soft and pretty or you’ll never find… well, I guess you already found yourself a husband, but now you have to keep him. Sometimes, that’s the hardest part.”
I shift uncomfortably. She wants me to explain, wants to understand the new dynamic she’s walked into. She was only gone for a couple months and now everything has changed. I wonder, if I was married to a rich white man, with no markings on his skin and the easy posture of privilege, would she have the same doubts that are so clearly written all over her face now?
“You shouldn’t be doing that,” I say instead of answering the unvoiced question, reaching meekly for the sink. “You need your rest. I know you said you’re fine, but we should get you checked out by a doctor, and maybe—”
“Nonsense,” Kate repeats, using the stern voice she used to reserve for when I’d come home high or wasted. “I’m fine. I can do my job. I’m sure you have other things to tend to.”
I almost scoff out of habit at the thought of having “things to tend to,” but then I remember that for once, it’s true. I have a whole damn wedding to plan, and as much as I wish I could put off this conversation forever, this is my chance to tell Kate everything, or at least, a safe version of everything.
“Yeah,” I begin. “I do have a lot to do, wedding planning and all.”
Kate hesitates, then sets the pot on the drying rack and reaches for the next dish. “I noticed you’re only wearing an engagement ring, but that man said you were already married.”
I cringe at the way she hits “that man,” like it’s a dirty spot on the street she’s trying to step around.
“His name is Javier, Javier Vega. We are technically married, in terms of signing paperwork and all that. We just… couldn’t wait, I guess. But the formal wedding isn’t until December. Also, we haven’t told anyone other than his people, and you now. Nobody else even knows we’re engaged yet.”
I know what she’s thinking, because I hear it all as I say the words. So rushed, so secretive. This marriage has soft, rotten spots everywhere you press, and we haven’t even been married a week yet.
“How did you meet him?” Kate asks carefully. “This Javier Vega?”
Fuck. There’s no logical reason for us to have met at all, outside of the truth, which is off limits and certainly illogical. There is no part of my old life that would have led me to him, although in retrospect, we were always closer than I ever could have known. The same poison that birthed me with a silver spoon forced him into a life in chains.
“Kate, look at me,” I say, deciding that the easiest way to answer the question is to swerve around it, and that the best lies are always born from truths. “I know what you’re thinking. I know you think Javier isn’t a good man, that you can tell he isn’t from the same circles as I am. That’s true. He has a past, and he’s more dangerous than you could ever know. But he… I… We need him, we both do. My parents lied, Kate, and Max did too. They got us into trouble, big trouble with men a thousand times more criminal than my husband. Javier is the only one who can get us out of that mess, and he’s the only one who can protect us from the fallout. I mean, look, he already brought you back to me. No one else could have done that.”
No one else could have done that, because Vega was the one who took her in the first place. I swallow back that fact as Kate considers this, then nods curtly. She doesn’t ask how that led to me marrying the man. In my world, the world she exists in but isn’t quite part of, women don’t marry men for love. They marry men who can provide what they need, be it money and power, like Isla, or rebellion and excitement, like my mother, or guns and protection. Like me.
“You have to trust me,” I say, grabbing Kate’s damp hand and forcing her to meet my eye. “Trust me by trusting him. He is a good man, and we need him.”
Kate gives me another nod, then turns back to her dishes. That’s it. Regardless of if she truly trusts me, which is doubtful, and fair, given my track history, she’s done pressing the issue. I gave her an order, after all, whether I meant it that way or not. I sigh and turn around, freezing with my palms on the edge of the counter, ass not quite leaning against the marble. Vega is standing in the doorway, hands in the pockets of his jeans, head cocked, a corner of his mouth lifted. He heard. Maybe not everything, but he heard enough. He thinks this means something, that I wasn’t just saying words to keep Kate off our case. He holds my gaze for a long moment, long enough for me to deny him. But I don’t. I just keep my eyes on his, wondering why I can’t bring myself to take back what I just said, why I can’t make myself tell him that my words were all lies. Because if I were to admit that he’s a good man, and that I need him, that would truly change everything.
Another infinite second passes between us, and then he turns and exits the kitchen, leaving me to sit alone with my words.
I knew better than to hope that last night was a one-time thing, but I’m still a little bit surprised when Vega lets himself into my bedroom close to midnight, finding me still awake. I crawled into bed an hour ago, but none of my breathwork and meditation techniques have managed to lull me to sleep yet. It’s probably the dread of this exact moment that kept me up so late.
I say nothing, and he doesn’t either, quietly kicking his shoes off and pulling his t-shirt over his head while I force my gaze away. I know there’s no point in trying to argue my way out of this, and I’m too exhausted to follow my instinct and try anyway. My breath catches as he lowers himself onto the mattress, staying on top of the duvet again, keeping to the far side of the bed. My hands pull the covers up tighter under my chin, and I mentally kick myself for putting on a lacey nightie instead of a chaste pair of leggings and a sweatshirt. On some level, did I do that on purpose? But then he’s clicking the lamp off, and it’s just us, half naked and in the dark.
It’s awkward, this silence. I’ve found myself in awkward silences in bed before, a common side effect of possessing bits that too many men don’t know how to excite, the biggest being my heart, but this is somehow worse. Lying here in bed with my husband, the man I barely know and have only kissed twice, is a new low. I don’t think he’s capable of feeling anything, let alone awkwardness, but I am, and I fidget uncontrollably between the silk sheets until I simply cannot stand the silence any longer.
“Have you ever been in love?”
It’s a shitty question to ask, far too prying for our relationship in real life, yet far too simple for our relationship on paper. But it’s the only thing I want to know, now that the option is totally off the table for me. I’ll never have love with this man, and now I’ll never get to have love without him. Though our marriage may be strictly a facade, I know instinctively that he’s not the type to share what’s his, emotionless though that label may be.
He’s not saying anything yet, not even acknowledging that I’ve spoken at all, so I forge on, blabbing out confessions that he likely doesn’t care about, but that’s what makes it easy to speak freely. He doesn’
t give a shit about me, and I don’t particularly give a shit what he thinks of me. Even better, it’s not like he’ll share my secrets with anyone. Who would he even tell? Miel? She already hates me, anyway.
“I don’t think I have, not really,” I admit. “There were times when I thought I was, here and there, and I told people I loved them, but… I don’t think that was it. That can’t be it. Because if what I felt then, if that’s all that being in love is, then what’s the point? It has to be more than that, this giant, life-changing feeling that people write songs and paint masterpieces over. That people live and die and kill for. A feeling like that, you wouldn’t have to question it. You would know. Right?”
He says nothing, doesn’t even flinch at the unrequested tirade I launched into the silence. I wait another minute, then sigh. I didn’t expect anything more from him. I flip to my side, turning my back to him, settling in for a long, sleepless night. Then he clears his throat.
“You would know,” he says, in a low, serious voice I’ve never heard from him before. “You would know if there was someone you would live and die and kill for.”
It’s not an answer, and it’s not not an answer. But it’s all I’m going to get. The mattress shifts beneath me, making my heart rise to my throat, and then he’s scooping me against him, tightening his arms around me as my body turns to stone. The duvet and sheets remain between us, but he’s still close, too close, too fucking close. My heart pounds so hard and fast he must feel it too, beating against him the way my fists wish they could.
“Why are you doing this?” I ask, and my voice comes out strangled. Why is he torturing me and pretending it’s because he cares about how I sleep at night? Why is he trying to kill me with false kindness?
“No more questions,” he says, and his voice is husky now, sleepy-sexy in a way that makes me swallow hard even as my breath still quavers. “Go to sleep, princesa.”
Caged: The Complete Trilogy Page 19
