Day one…

I wake up with a jerk. I am curled on my side on a lumpy mattress under a stiff blanket, and it takes me a minute to remember where I am, and why. My brain is dull and fuzzy. I tossed and turned all night. I don’t even remember falling asleep.

I’m about to sit up, but a cold wave of fear rolls over me, and I lie still. I don’t know why. I listen carefully. All I hear are traffic sounds outside the room. Still, I’m afraid to move. I sense something in the room with me. If I don’t move a muscle, will it go away? Or will it come closer?

I’ll count to a thousand and then get up.

One, two, three, four, five, six…

“How long are you going to pretend to be asleep?” an impatient voice growls at me. “I don’t have all day.” I start and fall out of bed, flailing. I scramble to my feet.

Sergei. Standing there. Staring at me with an amused curl to his cruel, beautiful mouth. He’s wearing a bespoke suit of light linen, and a silk shirt, in complementary tones of blue steel.

I’d forgotten how large he was – not just his body, but his presence. He’s easily 6’3” and has the shoulders of a linebacker. It’s that sense of animal menace prowling just under the surface that really defines him, though. When he’s in a room, he’s in command of everything, down to the molecules of oxygen.

He’s still every bit as stunning as I remember, a beautiful savage. Cruel, sensual lips, strong, broad jaw, laser-sharp blue eyes that can pierce every defense and every lie. Something’s a little different, though. I think I see shadows under his eyes, and a hollowness in his gaze.

“Hello,” I choke out, absurdly. What else is there to say?

How did he find me here?

I have my burner phone…could he have used that to track me? No, not that. When I’m not using it, I keep it turned off and have the battery removed so that there’s no chance anyone could use it to find me.

He smiles at me, but only with his mouth. He’s standing there staring at me, a calculating glint in his gaze. The shade of his blue eyes changes depending on his mood. Today they are so icy that I feel the chill everywhere his glance brushes against me.

I cross my arms over my chest, feeling self-conscious. My hair is tangled and I’m wearing my jeans and T-shirt from yesterday.

He takes one step forward. Only one. Sergei is a monster who likes to draw out his punishments, extracting maximum terror from every single second. I force myself not to flinch or cry out.

“Willow. What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?” His rich, strong voice caresses my ears. It’s spiced by his Russian accent, exotic and sexy and dangerous.

“I’m not that nice anymore. Thanks to you,” I say.

“Oh, you’ll always be a good girl, deep inside. Just because you like me to do dirty things to you doesn’t mean you’re not a sweet, sweet woman.” His voice is mocking, his gaze harsh. To him, being a decent, caring human being is a weakness.

I take a deep, shaky breath. “It can’t be a coincidence that you and Feodyr showed up here at the same time.”

Disgust curls his mouth. “No. I found you, and then Feodyr kidnapped one of my men and made him talk. I’ve been monitoring the police radio. I know he’s dead now. I wish I’d been the one to end him, but the result is the same. He’ll never hurt you again.”

The frustration that’s been bubbling up inside me explodes. I was so careful! We all were! And it was all for nothing.

“How the hell did you find me?” I demand. “Tell me!”

He moves towards me faster than thought, so fast I don’t even see it until he’s right on top of me. He grabs me by the throat. He backs me up against the wall. “Did you forget everything I taught you? That’s not how we do things.”

When I stayed with him, he ordered me to call him sir. He ordered me to obey him without question.

And he brutalized me and broke my heart. Not with his physical punishments – those were harsh, but a sick part of me craved them. No. What broke my heart was his emotional cruelty, and how he cast me aside without a second thought when I finally dared to defy him.

And now he’s back, after I’ve been gone for two months. Why now? Why at all?

His hand starts to tighten. Just a little.

“I’m sorry. Sir. Is that what you want to hear?” But there’s no deference in my voice like there once was.

“I must admit, I miss the sound of that.” His lips twist up in a cruel smile that reaches his eyes this time, and he drops his hand. He places his hands on the wall on either side of me, caging me in.

I breathe in his scent of cologne and masculine musk, and a flood of arousal washes over me and threatens to drown me. My nipples are swollen to sensitive nubs, rubbing against the thin fabric of my T-shirt.

I clear my throat and take a deep breath, trying to draw strength into my body and soul.

“Wh-wh-why are you here?” I never stammer around anyone else. Sergei snatches away all my self-confidence. I look up into his ice-blue eyes. “Our agreement has expired.”

“No, our agreement hasn’t expired. You left three days early.”

I don’t bother to argue with him, or beg, or plead. Sergei’s feelings for me, his behavior towards me, have never made any sense. I don’t think even he understands it – and that’s why he gets so angry with me.

Behind him I see the wall clock. 5:55 a.m. Six minutes until I’m supposed to call Anastasia. They’re sitting in a hotel somewhere, waiting. When I don’t call, they’ll go on the run. What I need to do right now is stall him. Give Anastasia and the kids time to put as much distance between him and them as possible.

“You want me to finish out the last three days?” I ask him cautiously.

He scoffs. “Is that what you think? You think you can just violate an agreement with me and then change your mind?”

Panic flares in me. When I was forced to live in his mansion in April, he killed a woman just for lying to him. What will he do to me? I used to think I knew him a little, but when he refused to let me go back to him, I realized that he was a stranger to me. I have no way of guessing what his next move will be.

How do you reason with a murdering psychopath who gets off on pain?

When I was serving out my thirty days in his mansion, I tried just about everything. I tried to be obedient and respectful. I tried to be kind and understanding. I tried to fight back. I tried to reason with him.

The only thing I didn’t try was outright seduction.

Would it work?

Only one way to find out.

I bite my lip.

“I…I missed you,” I whisper, and I’m shaking. I can’t even look him in the eyes when I say it. I’ve brushed up on a lot of my skills over the last couple of months, but I have never been a good liar.

He’s a stone statue, untouchable, unmoving. “You missed me so much you went into hiding? If you’d missed me, you knew where to find me.”

I don’t bother to remind him that when I tried to call him, he all but said he’d kill me if I went back.

He’s here. He hasn’t killed me…yet. There is still hope.

He moves his hand from my throat and cups my chin. He forces my face up so I have to look him right in the eye. “What did you miss about me, little Willow?” The cynical gleam in his eyes says that he knows that I’m lying.

I’ve seen what he does to people who lie to him.

“I...I missed when you punished me.” I whisper. And that’s the truth. Unfortunately.

“Did you really, now?” His hand tightens on my chin, and he jerks my head up even higher. I gasp in fear.

“Yes.” I choke on the word.

He drops his hand and takes a step back. “Well, I think we can arrange to make up for lost time.” He starts unbuckling his belt, and instantly my mind races back to those times in his playroom, when I quivered with fear and anticipation.

Everything else drops away from me. My worry for my family, for myself… I’m a terrible person. Every cell in my body is singing with anticipation. I want this, I want this…

“Turn around. Pull your pants down and step out of them.”

I obey, my hands shaking with eagerness rather than fear.

He slides his fingers into my panties and strokes me lightly. I jump.

“You kept yourself bare for me. Good.”

He strapped me down and had me waxed the first day I went to him. He likes me clean-shaven. For some reason, I’ve stayed in the habit, shaving myself regularly. And whenever I do, I picture him kneeling between my legs the way he did that day, lapping at me with his tongue.

And of course I’m wet. My body always betrays me. It chooses Sergei over self-respect. It wants him to punish my flesh with stinging blows and then thrust into me until I scream for release.

He slides my panties down, and when they fall to my ankles, I step out of them, in a trance.

“T-shirt,” he growls.

I take it off and drop it on the floor.

“Bra.”

I unhook it and drop it. I’m standing before him naked, and he’s fully clothed, just like always. I feel a twinge of sorrow. It’s a barrier to intimacy. It makes me feel like a whore.

“Lift your hands over your head.”

I do, stretching them, shivering in the air-conditioned chill. I feel goose pimples pebbling my skin.

“I’m c-c-cold,” I stammer.

He ignores that. “Turn around.” He looks me up and down, and I can feel the heat of his gaze on my naked skin.

I pirouette in a slow circle, and as I do, I glance at the clock again. Five minutes have gone by.

Anastasia will be waiting for my call right now. Within minutes, if she follows the plan, they’ll grab their bags and flee.

I also see that he’s pulled his belt out, holding it in his hands, and he’s hard. The thick length of his cock is outlined perfectly against the fabric of his pants.

He sheds his jacket, tosses it onto a chair. The blue-gray silk of his shirt caresses the swell of his biceps.

“Did you miss me at all?” I ask, my voice little more than a whisper. I brace myself for cruel laughter. He gives me nothing; just a hard, indifferent stare.

“What do you think?” He arches an eyebrow.

My gaze drops to the floor. “I don’t know. I never have any idea what’s in your head.”

“That’s right. And that’s the way I like it. Now bend over. Hands on the bed.”

I do, and I clutch the bedspread so hard that my knuckles are white.

He walks over and trails his hands over my bare ass, between my cheeks, lightly grazing over my pussy.

Then he kicks my legs wider apart. I stagger but keep my hold on the bedspread.

He just stands there for what feels like an eternity. Then his voice behind me makes me jump. “I’d tell you that it’s only going to hurt for a minute, but that would be a lie.”