The lock on the door made her exhausted muscles tense, but she knew better than to pull on the cuffs now. Bruised and aching, re-tethered on her stomach during his last visit, her wrists and ankles had to be a multi-colored mess under the leather. “Oh, princess, you lucky girl…”

Lianna didn’t speak, didn’t react, it only seemed to entertain him when she begged. He ripped her head back by her hair anyway, straining her neck as she tried to brace her elbows against the floor.

“Still in there, princess? Because we’re not done yet.” A low, dark laugh rumbled behind the mask as he dropped her back to the mattress. She waited for him to hurt her, to bring out some new torment, but instead she felt him working at the cuff on her ankle. “Daddy just sold his controlling shares in Dargen Technologies, and that’s one less way for him to launder money.”

Recognition bloomed inside her at the name. Dargen was a relatively small company. They made hardware. What exactly did they make? She couldn’t remember, but money laundering? Somewhere inside the mess her mind had become she tried to connect dots, but then her other leg was uncuffed and he flipped her effortlessly. Intense eyes stared out from the mask, wild in the excitement of his fresh success.

“Tell me, do you think he’s finally decided you’re important enough to protect?” He brushed her cheek and she turned away from him, refusing to answer as he started to uncuff her hands. Those fingers brushed her arm just below the last cuff. “Or do you think he’s enjoying the videos?”

“He’s going to find me.” The words were rough, her throat too dry, but he’d heard her. A huff of a laugh escaped him, and then she was free from the chains. The man didn’t even try to stop her as she rushed to get away from him, scrambling for the wall to curl up against it while her body rang with reminders of pain and the stiffness of being chained down for so long.

Laughing to himself, he gathered the chains slowly, but Lianna had no doubt as his hungry gaze crawled over her bruised skin that he would take great joy in punishing her, taking her again if her father didn’t jump through whatever hoops he had concocted next. He paused at the door, holding it open like a taunt. “Just one more question. Don’t you think if he could find this place, he would have already come for you?”

She opened her mouth to answer, but he was gone, and she wasn’t sure what to say anyway. As soon as the grinding sound of the lock confirmed he wasn’t coming back, she dragged the mattress into the corner and curled up where it felt safest.

Still a stupid idea.

She wasn’t safe. One thing the man had made very clear was that nothing could protect her. Nothing could stop him. If he wanted her chained, he chained her. If he wanted to touch her, he did. If he wanted her to scream, or beg, or cry, or come — she did.

And he proved it again and again as time passed in fits and bursts. Dragging in his absence, with no clock and no change in the strange lighting to signal it… and then there would be another sandwich. A paper plate of lunch meat. A protein bar. Meals that seemed to come at no set interval, but how was she supposed to tell how many hours passed? How long had she even been in this room? How long had it been since he’d come to the apartment, and taken her?

Days? A week?

A hysterical giggle erupted from her lips and she pulled her legs tighter to her chest on the mattress. If only she really were a princess there might be a prince looking for her instead of a father weighing the return on investment to each fucking decision. Because risk analysis and financial reports weren’t going to help her escape this prison. ROI wasn’t going to do shit for her against a thick, metal door, and there was definitely no negotiating with the villain in this hell.

Her gaze rolled upwards as she wondered if anyone was concerned about her absence, if her friends had even noticed she’d been gone. Maybe if she hadn’t just ditched Denise it was possible, but with the way she worked? With the way her father expected her to? It was likely no one even knew.

And the people who did know clearly weren’t rushing to save her.

It could have been days and days and she wouldn’t know. Was there even a point to time anymore with that neutral, half-light coming from the gray ceiling? Neither morning, nor noon, nor night.

It was nothing.

The room was nothing — and she was dissolving inside it.

* * *

David

Staring at the screen, he wasn’t sure how he felt. Good? Bad? Victorious? Corrupt?

All of the above seemed to fit, and not, at the same time. It was a fucking mess, and one thing he was sure of was that he had no idea how to reconcile it. Harry had called, three times in the last day, and he hadn’t answered. At least the man had been smart enough not to leave a voicemail, but the knowledge that Robert Mercier was calling in favors was still eating at him.

Somewhere there was someone who could probably route those videos and emails back to him. It would take time, but would it be enough time to destroy the man before it all came crashing down? That was something David couldn’t answer.

Thinking over the plan used to be comforting. He would outline every piece of it, down to the last detail, and it had felt solid. Perfect. Unbreakable.

Yet, here he was a full day or more behind schedule because Robert Mercier didn’t care enough to save his own fucking daughter.

And you can’t stop fucking her.

Kicking the leg of the table, David stood and paced away from the computer.

There was something undeniably satisfying in hurting Lianna Mercier, in hearing her scream and cry out — but there was also no denying the urge he had to hear her come.

Even when he’d uncuffed her ankles to flip her to her stomach, the entire plan had been to take her ass. To make her scream, to make it hurt, and instead he’d just taken her cunt again. Rubbed her clit, made her come before he’d chained her down once more. It was starting to become a problem.

Belting her again had been impulsive. Reactive. He’d been too close, too gentle. Fuck, he’d treated her like any other girl he might have taken to bed, and Lianna Mercier was not like any other girl. She was the heir to the devil, the man who had taken everything from him, from his family, and he owed it to them and so many others to get their revenge.

No matter how many graves it took.

But when he thought about Lianna in one of those graves, something reacted in him. Something he couldn’t quite describe, but it was twisted up in all of the confusing heat that dealing with the Merciers had caused. But had she been involved? Did she know? There was no more calming ice inside him, no more solid core to lean on, everything was shaky. Everything was melting and breaking down, and that made it hard to think straight.

Picking up the bottle of rum again he was surprised to see it almost half-empty. Hadn’t he just opened it? Ignoring the magic of disappearing rum, he sat down on the cot and picked up the picture he kept on top of the small fridge.

There were promises he’d made. Promises that meant more than the well-being of one spoiled blonde girl who was the heir to Robert Mercier’s corrupt enterprise… right? Staring into the picture he wished he could hear the voices captured there once more, to know for sure if he was correct, or if Harry was the one who was right.

When he leaned back on the wall he could see the monitor with her on it, her pale form huddled in the corner, a shining beacon of pale skin and golden hair.

An angel.

She looked like one, absolutely felt like one, and as he stared at the screen he realized what was really bothering him. The same idea that had come up once before — she had never threatened him. Not with the power of her family, not to kill him, nothing. After everything he’d done to her, after every way he’d hurt her, she had only ever talked about her father finding her.

Saving her. From him.

David’s stomach roiled, acid etching the back of his throat as he stared at her form on the mattress in the corner. Could she actually be innocent? Could she be good? Could the offspring of the devil still be an angel?

A beep came from the computer and he pushed himself up from the cot, carrying the rum with him as he moved towards it to see what it was. Laughing under his breath he sat down hard in the chair and read through the email again.

“Well, look at that, Dad,” he muttered under his breath and tilted the rum up again.