Aras

She barely spoke above a whisper, but I didn’t miss her words.

“Was that a question?” Gaspar, the one I had told to speak, asked.

“No,” the woman responded.

Even though she was talking to Gaspar, her eyes hadn’t left me.

I wondered how she had figured it out.

She hadn’t seen my face, didn’t even know how tall I was really, but somehow, in the short space of the past few seconds, she’d figured out that I had been the one in her townhouse.

I had watched her enough to know that she was intelligent, but this was something else.

Or not.

I tried to remind myself of that, keep focused on the task at hand, though it was difficult.

Gaspar was standing close enough to touch her, and when he actually did, it had taken everything in my power not to rip his fucking hand off.

I should have handled this myself.

I didn’t often second-guess myself, but I had screwed up.

I had wanted to observe Lake getting accustomed to her surroundings but also wanted to see how she would respond to them.

But what I hadn’t counted on was the burning rage that was initially a simmer and now a boil in my stomach.

Gaspar glanced at me, probably confirming what I suspected Lake already knew. I didn’t react, but he still got the message.

“Behave yourself,” he said to Lake. “I’ll catch you later.”

He smacked her on the ass, chuckled, and then walked toward the door.

I left first, followed by Roman, then Gaspar.

The door shut and Gaspar turned to look at me.

“She’s a nice piece of—”

The words he would have said died in his throat when I wrapped my hand around it and squeezed.

“Did I tell you to touch her?” I asked.

Like always, my voice was soft, a whisper really.

I didn’t need to yell to get my point across, something that was clear when Gaspar started to babble.

“No. I was just—”

I applied pressure, pushing a little bit harder as the seconds ticked by.

“Don’t let it happen again,” I said.

I released him, watching as he coughed and then gulped a deep breath.

I turned and walked away, deciding it was better to leave than to risk giving in to the impulse to break his neck on the spot.

Because I was sorely tempted.

Seeing Gaspar’s hand on her had made something in me snap.

I didn’t understand the why, didn’t even really understand that reaction, but Lake was mine.

I knew that now with a crystal clarity that could not be denied.

The reasons that had brought her here were irrelevant.

She was mine.

Lake

I stood in the same spot long after the men had left.

I didn’t have anywhere to go and didn’t know what to do.

That was a lie.

I knew the only thing to do was comply, do whatever they said, and hope for the best.

Easier said than done.

My headache had lessened, and I touched my cheek. It was tender, but the bruise wouldn’t be too bad.

I thought back to that moment, the fear that had gripped me as I had watched his fist approach.

Except now, having looked at the person who had thrown the punch, I realized I was lucky.

There was no way he had hit me with the full force of his power. If he had, I probably would have died.

But what I didn’t understand was why.

Why he had held back, why I was here, why he had taken me, but hadn’t done any of the horrible things I would have expected.

My knees were getting stiff, my thighs burning from the position the heels forced my legs into.

Still, I stayed, glancing around the room.

Couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched.

I had felt that before, had lived with it for years.

Early on, Vlad had told me he was always watching.

I’d had no reason to disbelieve him, and though I’d never had any independent proof, I just went on like he was, doing what I could to try to make it through.

But over the last several weeks, something had felt different.

Like always, so much of my energy was focused on Vlad, I hadn’t taken the time to really think it through. But now, it seemed I had time to do so.

I finally stepped out of the heels.

I let out a little shriek when my feet touched the cold floor but then breathed a sigh of relief at the joy of being out of those shoes.

I stood, reveling in the relief, but then froze when I was struck by a realization.

I had been kidnapped.

I waited for panic, waited for something, and while I felt some anxiety, it wasn’t nearly as much as I would have expected.

Pathetic as it was, it meant I wouldn’t have to see Vlad, at least not today.

The giggle bubbled up at the base of my throat, and I let out a bit of laughter, but then just as abruptly cut off.

The laughter felt manic, probably my way of coping with what was happening to me, but I felt certain that if I let the laugh out, tears would follow, and even in this situation, I wouldn’t allow that.

So instead I grabbed the shoes and walked toward the cot.

A far cry from Vlad’s king bed, but I lay on it anyway and was surprised that it was marginally comfortable.

As I looked at the ceiling, rough-hewn, made of what appeared to be concrete, I thought back over the weeks before, trying to pinpoint when things had started to feel different.

I wasn’t sure, but it had.

The feeling of being watched by Vlad was ever-present, but I’d gotten used to it. By now, it was no more than background noise.

But somewhere along the way, that had changed.

In particular, I remembered a trip to the only grocery store Vlad would let me go to.

The entire time I had felt like someone was there, been certain that when I got back to the townhouse Vlad would be waiting for me, ready to punish me for some slight or another.

My nerves had been jangling the whole trip, and I hadn’t even been relieved when I got back and found the townhouse empty.

The feeling had cropped up a couple of other times, moments when I was in the townhouse, feeling like there was another presence there.

Because there had been.

Back then I had chalked it up to paranoia and just ignored it.

But someone had been watching me.

He had been watching me.