Once Monster leaves and I am alone again, I immediately start berating myself for being so weak and stupid as to have slept with him. When he looked at me for that moment of confirmation… when I nodded…

When I came so hard that practically gushed all over his cock, I gave him my permission.

And that little bit of permission was my only damned bargaining chip. Now I am defenseless against him, worse than useless.

Tears well up in my eyes as I think about what I have done. Worse, I’ve devalued myself.

I feel… defiled. Used. Broken.

Torn apart, in a way that I can never get back.

I get dressed very slowly, blaming myself. Blaming Monster, for being exactly what his name says that he is. Crying over a loss that I can’t explain.

Not the loss of my virginity, because that isn’t anything to mourn. But the loss of my freedom. My happiness. My whole life in New Orleans.

Gone gone gone.

I lie in my bed, my comforter pulled up around my neck. I try to calm myself, closing my eyes. I must fall asleep, because when I open my eyes again, I see Sin’s face. He’s shaking me.

“Wake up,” he whispers, looking over his shoulder.

“Why are you—”

He stops my words by putting his fingers against my mouth. “Sssshhhh.”

Sitting up, I try to shake off my sleeping state. Sin looks around, spying my open bathroom door. He motions for me to be quiet, then heads to the bathroom. I follow on silent feet, insanely curious what exactly is going on.

He seals us inside the bathroom, but he still speaks so low that I almost can’t hear him. He gets right up next to my ear, whispering.

“You still want to leave?”

I pull back, running a hand through my blonde hair. “Why?”

Sin looks aggravated. “Yes or no?”

“Of course I do—”

“Keep your voice down!” he whispers, glancing at the door behind him. “Jesus fucking christ, do you want us to get caught or something?”

Staring at him for several long seconds, I try to piece everything together. “You’re saying…”

“I heard him talking. He’s gonna fire me and replace me with someone you’re not attracted to, or some crazy shit.”

“And?” I say, hopeful.

“And this is likely my last chance to get you out of the house.”

He’s not expecting how fast and hard I hug him, judging from the sound he makes. “Oooff.”

Tears prick my eyes, happy tears. I haven’t let myself imagine escape very many times since that first time, but now…

Sin pushes me off. “No crying. We don’t have that kind of time.”

Sniffling and wiping at my nose with the back of my wrists, I nod. “Okay. Do you have a plan?”

He looks very intense. “Yeah. Well, sort of. It’s not what I would call really solid, but… it’ll do.”

Anxiety races up my spine. “What is it?”

“He’s leaving for the airport soon. I’m supposed to drive into town to pick up some supplies shortly after he leaves. I think the best bet would be for you to hide in the trunk of the car. That way, I can smuggle you out without anyone looking for you. No one will think to check my trunk.”

He sounds more confident than his expression indicates. I narrow my gaze.

“What if it doesn’t work?”

“What if it does?”

Sighing, I turn to pace on the bathroom floor. “If it doesn’t work, if we get caught… I mean, he will kill us both. Literally. He already suspects some kind of affection between us…”

Sin glowers, crackling his knuckles. “He suspects more than that. He questioned my men about our relationship.”

For a second, I waste time being upset that Monster would even think that there was a relationship between the me and Sin. How could there ever be, when all the air in every room I’ve been in since I got here is sucked up by Monster?

I take a deep breath to steady myself. “When do you think we should go?”

He looks at his watch. “It’s three thirty. He’s supposed to leave at four. I think it would be best if we got you out into the car now, before everybody starts to wake up.”

My stomach drops. “Right now?”

“Yep. I think that it’s our best shot. Our only one, assuming that you really want out of here.”

My heart squeezes. “Of course I want out.”

“Well… let’s go. If we go down to the front gate, the cars should already be parked there, ready and waiting.”

Silence stretches between us for a second as I try to still my racing heart. “Can I just… have just a minute in here, alone?”

Sin raises his brows, but inclines his head. He quietly lets himself out of the bathroom, and I close the door behind him. As I quickly use the restroom, I try to wrap my mind around the fact that I am actually on the verge of escaping.

My freedom, something I thought was gone forever, is suddenly and inexplicably within my reach. Instead of worry about what Monster wants or what Monster thinks, I might soon be able to think about what I want. What I think.

I laugh quietly to myself, the first fit of humor since I arrived here. How fitting that it should be in the moment I leave.

Then I let myself out of the bathroom, moving on silent feet. Sin waits for me, keeping watch at the bedroom doorway.

“Ready?” he mouths. I nod, trying not to be too fearful.

After I leave this room, though, there is no going back. And if I flee, I’ll be running for my life.

Gripping the hem of my dress anxiously, I follow Sin out of the bedroom and down the darkened hallways. The house is hushed at this hour and everything is so shut down. My footsteps seem loud; by comparison, Sin’s booted feet sound quiet. As he leads me around corners and down the back stairway, I swear my heart is so noisy in my own ears that I am genuinely worried it might draw attention to our passage.

I keep thinking what is Monster doing right now? What if he comes to the part of the house where we are sneaking through? It would be an anomaly, sure, but it’s not impossible.

In the back of my mind, I am already cringing about what he will do and say if he finds us. Already preparing for the moment of truth. I can’t stop picturing both of us kneeling on the ground as Monster stands before us, looking particularly deadly.

I know what men like my father call shooting someone point blank to the head. Execution style.

The knowledge is like a lump of cold hard coal solidifying in the pit of my stomach. As I follow Sin down the final flight of stairs, I can’t help the tremors that make my hands shake. Sin stops on the bottom step, holding up his hand. I take that to mean I should stop.

He turns still as stone, listening intently. Long seconds tick by, without me having a clue what he hears. I just stand behind him, hoping and praying that Monster isn’t about to come around the corner.

Then Sin starts moving again, waving me forward into the ill-lit hallway. We turn a corner, and Sin tugs me toward the mansion’s front door. For some reason, that in itself causes me anxiety.

I’ve never been through the front door. I’ve never had any reason to do so, to be honest.

He creeps along stealthily, and I follow him around several corners. Then at last we are at the front door, and he gives me the gesture to wait again.

He slinks forward to the actual door, as elegant as a panther. The door has a large plate glass window in the middle, and Sin peers out of it.

I do my best to wait silently, even though I am shivering so violently that you can actually hear my teeth chatter. To my right, the grand staircase rises upstairs. All around, there are hardwood floors and bland beige walls. I try to count the floorboards, to calm myself down.

Again, Sin is still and quiet. Again, the waiting seems to take forever, though it couldn’t have been more than a minute.

Then he’s apparently satisfied, because Sin swiftly moves to open the door. In my head, I was prepared for an alarm to start shrieking, but of course it doesn’t.

No need to set an alarm on a door when you have a team of private security guys on hand to guard your whole property.

Sin pulls the door wide, motioning me forward. I hesitate, and then walk out of the doorway. I look down at the cars, parked a hundred yards away from where I stand. Two Mercedes-Benzes, both perfectly white as if to match the house.

The front yard is perfectly still and quiet. I look up at the mountainous areas that I know are splayed out all around the house. I can feel something. Or sense something.

I motion to Sin to wait, but he emphatically shakes his head. He encourages me to move forward, his eyes roving, ever vigilant. He grabs me by the arm, jerking me forward, and we go down a few steps.

To our right, I can see the broad clay steps that lead around back. To the left, I can see the edge of the stables. Sin propels me straight ahead, fishing the keys to the Benz out of his tactical vest.

Again, there is something that is off about everything, some little sense of wrongness. But I let Sin hurry me around to the back of the car, where he pops the trunk. I hesitate again only a couple feet away from the car.

This just feels wrong. Sin pushes me roughly toward the trunk.

“Get in,” he whispers harshly. “Right now, before—”

Then all hell breaks loose. A bullet zings through the air, missing Sin by mere inches. He crouches and moves closer to the Benz trying to figure out where the gunfire came from.

“Shit,” I hear him mutter.

Large lights come up on the lawn, illuminating it. I hear men running down the steps leading from the backyard. I peek around the car and see that Sin is between them and me.

I bet they’ve been told not to shoot me. At least, I hope so…

My heart pounding, I take off in the opposite direction, toward the stables. The men behind me are yelling in Spanish, but I can understand their meaning well enough.

Get her!

I sprint for the stables, my arms and legs pumping, my brain struggling to compute. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a glimpse of Monster from afar. He’s coming down the front stairs, not even looking at me yet.

Yes, there may be a chance yet.

If I can just get into the forest, past the stables… I might be able to escape still.

Gritting my teeth, I haul myself toward the stables, running flat out.