THE OBNOXIOUS WHINE OF LUCIAN’S alarm clock pulled me from a happy dream, and I rolled over with a groan. Who set their alarm on a Saturday? Truthfully, I couldn’t even recall the last time I’d woken to an alarm. One of the perks of my job was that I had the luxury of sleeping in and planning my day accordingly.
That didn’t mean I was lazy. Quite the opposite was true. I was driven by a primal need, and I’d never forgotten the days when my motivations were the choice between life and death. After Birdie and I got out of California, our lives had taken a dramatic turn. I didn’t think it was selfish to do what was best for us for a change. I never felt for a second that putting us first was wrong when we’d spent our whole lives coming in dead last. And just because Lucian was rigid in his schedule didn’t mean I had to be too. So, when I heard him move from the bed, I chose to ignore his request for me to get up and get ready for the day.
He’d already taken everything away from me anyway, so I didn’t see what else he could really do. There was also the matter of facing him after he’d spent the entire night holding me in his arms. A surreal and unfathomable truth. I didn’t want to discuss it, or think about it, or even try to play this whole situation off as normal when I looked him in the eye. So I kept snoozing. For all of about twenty minutes until he returned.
“Am I to believe you’ve suddenly grown hard of hearing?”
When I opened my eyes, he was in front of me. Fresh from the shower and naked from the waist up.
I tried not to look.
While I could appreciate the art of a male body when I saw a good one, I certainly didn’t want to appreciate this one. Even if it was beautiful and muscular and lean.
“It’s Saturday.” I wedged my head beneath the pillow and closed my eyes.
“Very good,” Lucian replied. “You get a gold star for that. But you know what you don’t get a star for?”
“Are these stars theoretical?” I mumbled.
“Ignoring a direct order,” he answered. “Is everything going to be a fight with you, Gypsy?”
“Probably. I did try to warn you.”
He was quiet for a minute, and I waited patiently for the next threat. I was already prepared to get out of bed and do his bidding when he yanked back the covers and hauled me up into his arms. An awful squeal ejected from my throat as he carried me into the bathroom, and I laid in his grasp like a limp noodle.
“What are you doing?”
His answer was to turn on the shower and force me directly beneath the spray. The ice-cold spray. I was still in my tee shirt and yoga pants, and he was officially the king of assholes.
“This is bullshit.” I crossed my arms and shivered. “Let me out of here.”
Lucian didn’t move from the shower entry, and the only way to leave was to push past him. He knew I wouldn’t do that, and it wasn’t fair.
“You’re a bastard,” I thundered. “Do you know that? What they say about you is true. Every word.”
He didn’t even flinch. My words had no effect on him, and they were the only weapons I currently had in my arsenal.
He crossed his arms and leaned casually against the wall. “Are you going to behave? Are you going to do as you’re told?”
“Why should I?” I shot back.
“Because that was the agreement we made.”
He had a point, even if I didn’t like it. I still didn’t like him either, and I had a feeling the longer I spent with him, the more I would grow to hate him. But I was freezing, and right now, I was willing to lose the battle if it meant I still had a chance in the war.
“Fine, whatever. Will you leave now so I can take a shower in peace?”
He checked his watch. “You have ten minutes.”
I reached for the knob to turn up the heat, but a flash of color on his retreating form caught my eye and my curiosity. Knowing Lucian as the straight-laced man he was, it shocked me to see the vivid riot of colors on his back.
It looked as if the asshole had a tattoo.
When I stepped out of the shower, the wet clothes I’d discarded on the floor were gone, and on the counter was a new set. The same crappy tee shirt. The same yoga pants. I drew in a deep breath and groaned. This was not turning out to be a good day, and I hadn’t even had my coffee yet.
It pissed me off that I had a closet full of designer clothes, and he wanted me to wear this crap. I had come too far in my life to regress so fast, and I couldn’t stomach another second of it. Sometimes, my temper got the best of me, and the only thing to do was roll with it and deal with the consequences later.
A search of the bathroom cabinets turned up a pair of trimming scissors, and I went to work cutting the clothes into bits. It pleased me more than it should have as I thought about the possibilities. How many pairs of these clothes could he have? And how many ways could I find to destroy them?
Knowing he’d be back to retrieve me when the ten minutes were up, I brushed my hair and sat on the counter, wrapped in a towel while I waited. Every second felt like a minute, and when he finally came back, my nerves were coiled so tight I worried how I might react when he inevitably exploded. But he didn’t. He walked into the bathroom as cool as ever, eyeing the discarded shreds on the floor.
“I take it you don’t like the clothes.”
“You get a gold star for that,” I chirped.
It really wasn’t smart to provoke him, but there was an innate need within me to know the limits with him. How far could I push him before he reacted? What would he do when he got really mad? These things were important. These things defined the boundaries of my life with him for the next two years.
Lucian stooped down to pick up the discarded clothes. I’d only ever seen him in a suit, but today, he was wearing jeans and a tee shirt. It was a different look for him. A casual look. I couldn’t make sense of this guy. He was completely loaded, yet he acted like none of it mattered to him.
“If you didn’t like the clothes, all you had to do was say so.” He discarded them into the trash bin.
I was pretty sure it was a trick, but I played along anyway. “Well, I don’t like them. I want my clothes back.”
“I told you that you have to earn them,” he answered. “And one thing you should know about me, Gypsy, is that I never go back on my word.”
I looked up at his dark eyes, trying to figure out what my next move should be. But truthfully, I didn’t have one. I refused to degrade myself by cleaning his house, yet I knew there was no reasoning with him.
“Hand me your towel,” he ordered.
I squeezed my arms down around it, prepared to fight. “No.”
He cocked his head to the side, examining me. “No?”
“No,” I repeated, but this time I sounded less sure.
All I had on beneath was a pair of underwear. Last night, I made it through unscathed, but it was apparent he had no intentions of allowing that to continue. This was what I’d feared all along. He would take me against my will.
I couldn’t let it happen. I wouldn’t. But when he stepped into my space and pried my fingers off the cotton, there was little I could do but yelp as we struggled for dominance over the towel. Ultimately, as he had with most of our disputes so far, he won.
I slapped my hands over my breasts and took a step back, glaring at him. “You aren’t touching me.”
His eyes didn’t leave my face. “Did I say that I was?”
My lips slammed shut, and something in his voice made me shiver. The hammering pulse in his neck alerted me to the fact that my remark set him on edge. I was finally tiptoeing a boundary with him, and I desperately wanted to retreat. He had never looked so foreboding, and I didn’t know what would happen next.
“You should think very carefully before you make snap judgments about someone,” he said.
I stared past him to avoid the intensity in his eyes. “Usually, my judgments are pretty accurate.”
“I told you I wouldn’t hurt you.” He folded the towel in his hands and wedged it beneath his arm, and the ritual seemed to bleed away some of the tension in his body. “I gave you my word. But I did promise that I would punish you, and I intend to do so now.”
I couldn’t prepare myself for either fight or flight because he walked out of the bathroom without another word. I stood there dumbly, trying to determine what course of action to take before I trailed after him. But I stopped short at the sight of him emerging from the closet with a pair of my Jimmy Choos.
I gulped in a breath, my fingers trembling as I moved toward him. “What are you doing?”
“I told you not to use foul language,” he said. “You’re more intelligent than that.”
Desperation left me to chase after him as he carried my favorite pair of shoes down the hall and into the kitchen.
“I didn’t!”
“You called me a bastard in the shower,” he said calmly. “I warned you about speaking that way. Maybe next time you will remember it.”
Horror froze me to the spot as he tossed the shoes into the sink and then unceremoniously dumped bleach all over them.
“Are you crazy?” I bellowed. “Do you have any idea how much those cost?”
He discarded the ruined shoes into the garbage. “What does it matter to you? I’m almost certain you didn’t pay for them.”
Blackness threatened the edges of my vision, and it hurt to breathe. He couldn’t understand. He had no idea what he was doing to me. He wasn’t just taking my possessions, he was taking my pride. “I earned those.”
He laughed in a humorless, condescending way, and I wanted to rip his throat out. “Someday, you will come to understand that material possessions can’t buy you happiness, pet.”
“This is bull—” I stopped short, and he offered me a bemused smile.
“See? You’re learning already.”
Bitterness coated my tongue, and I couldn’t remember feeling this low since I’d left California. There was no intelligent conversation to be had with him. Only the venom that flew from my lips. “I hate you.”
His eyes were an inky melancholy when he stepped closer, brushing a thumb over my cheek. I didn’t want to tremble, but it happened involuntarily.
“Save your words, pet,” he whispered. “I haven’t even given you a reason to hate me yet.”