CHARLOTTE

I screamed as loud as I could, the sound echoing off the concrete walls and reverberating around the cellar.

“Oh, come on, Charlotte, don’t be scared,” Mikayla said, rolling her eyes. “Remember how brave you were that night at Force?” She still had her camera trained on me, taunting me.

Before I could reply, the side door Lameuix had walked through opened again, and Bia came out, followed by Professor Worthington. He was thinner than I remembered --- probably from being on the run after escaping from prison – and dressed in a pair of raggedy cargo pants and a red and tan checked shirt that hung loose on his frame. When his eyes met mine, fear and loathing filled my body, so strong I was afraid I might have a panic attack.

“Good job, Mikayla,” Bia said approvingly when she saw me sprawled on the floor. “Jesus, you must have gotten her down here right away.” She sighed. “I don’t know why Noah would be with such a do-gooder, but to each his own, I guess.”

“Fuck you,” I spit.

Bia grinned. “Feisty, I like that.”

“Hello, baby,” Professor Worthington said, staring at me with affection. He was holding a gun, which was pointed toward me, but his face showed nothing but affection. The sight of him, here, underground, made bile rise in my throat. I remembered the feel of his hands on me that night at Force, and scenes from that night pulsed through my brain.

Noah on the floor, bleeding out.

The auction.

The professor leading me up that back staircase toward the stage, Mikayla and I tied together.

Mikayla.

Jesus.

She’d been in on this the whole time. I’d been running around New York, risking everything for her, and she’d been in on it the whole time, had been luring me here the same way Noah had been trying to lure the professor.

A moment later, Noah appeared at the bottom of the staircase, his own gun drawn.

“A gun,” Lameuix said, nodding in approval when he saw it. “Good thinking.” He was still wearing that crisp button-up and pressed khakis, and he reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a cigar. “Where’s my lighter, Bia?”

She reached into the pocket of his pants and pulled out the lighter, then lit his cigar for him.

Noah pointed the gun at Lameuix and cocked the trigger.

“You sick motherfucker,” he said, taking in the video equipment and the tiny camera that Lameuix held, putting together what was going on. “You’ve done some fucked up shit in your life, but filming murders really brings you to a whole other level of psychopath.” He smiled. “Impressive. I’m going to enjoy blowing your fucking head off.”

“Noah,” I pleaded from the floor, not sure what, exactly, I was pleading for.

He looked down at me, his jaw tightening. “Are you hurt?”

“No.” I reached behind me and rubbed my tailbone. It was bruised, but not broken. “I don’t think so.”

“Stand up and get behind me, Charlotte. Do not move unless I tell you to.”

“Noah, please.” I stood up and did as he said, but we needed to think this through. It was two of us and one gun against four of them and one gun – we were outnumbered, and needed a better plan Noah just declaring he was going to enjoy blowing Lameuix’s head off.

“Don’t try to tell him what do to, Charlotte,” Lameuix chided. “You know Noah Cutler doesn’t listen to anyone but himself.” He took a long drag of his cigar and then set down the camera he was holding on a dusty wooden workbench. He smiled at me. “The camera’s a nice touch, but it’s really only for show, “ he explained. He gestured around the basement as if he were showing off the control room of a popular television show instead of a torture chamber he used to make films of rapes and murders. “We have cameras trained on you everywhere, every angle, catching every scream, every cut, every kill.”

The sound of a gun cocking came through the air, but before I could realize it wasn’t Noah’s – his gun was already cocked -- I felt someone press a barrel of a gun to my temple.

“Hello, Charlotte,” a familiar voice sing-songed against my ear. “We meet again.” Professor Worthington’s hand grasped my arm and I looked down and watched as his nails dug into me, breaking the skin. His nails were dirty, his breath stale. I caught sight of an open door behind him, and beyond that, a hallway lined with empty cages. He must have slipped back through the door he’d come through right before Noah got down here, and reemerged behind me. There must have been a network of secret passageways under the house.

I whimpered as my legs went weak.

Noah turned the gun on Professor Worthington. “Let her go.”

The professor pushed his own gun harder against my temple, the metal warm, even though it should have been cold.

I wondered if the gun had been fired lately, where he’d gotten it, if he’d brought it here with him or if Lameuix had given it to him.

“Noah,” I moaned. “Please.”

Noah’s eyes were steel and I watched as his index finger turned white. He was gripping the trigger as hard as he could without firing the gun. I knew I was the only thing keeping him from doing it – if he could have been sure of getting off a shot that wouldn’t hurt me, he would have killed the professor right then and there.

“I’ll kill her,” Professor Worthington said. “Her brains will splatter and you can watch the whole thing.”

It was a standoff, one that Mikayla was getting all on film, and that Bia and Lameuix were watching with interest as if it were a move. Which, I guess, it was.

Finally, Noah dropped the gun.

He threw it away from himself, and it skidded across the dirty cement floor before coming to rest near Bia’s feet. She picked it up and looked at it. “Nice,” she said approvingly, her eyes roaming over the gun. “Never would have taken you for a Remington guy, Noah, but I guess sticking to the basics is always good.”

As soon as he realized that Noah didn’t have a gun anymore, Professor Worthington let me go. I fell to my knees, gasping for air. Noah rushed to me, his hands on my face. “Are you okay?” he said. “Did he hurt you?”

“I’m okay.”

“Get away from her,” Professor Worthington said, his voice calm and evil.

Noah ignored him, gripping my chin and pulling my face up and forcing me to look at him. “Everything’s going to be okay,” he said. “Just do what I say and trust me, do you understand?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

Noah kissed me on the lips, which enraged the professor. He fired the gun into the air, the sound shaking and rattling the walls as plaster from the ceiling flaked off. The muffled sounds of women screaming came from behind the door Professor Worthington had walked through, and the noise slid up my spine and rattled my brain.

“Jesus Christ, Colin, fucking relax,” Noah said.

“It’s finally time,” Professor Worthington said, sounding almost awed. “It’s finally time for me to do what I’ve always wanted to do to you.” He scratched his chin, where a rough dusting of whiskers had bloomed on his skin. “It won’t be soft, or slow. It will be long and drawn out. The audience likes a long, slow burn.”

“Fuck you,” Noah said, his eyes blazing. His hands tightened into fists by his side and he began to move back toward me, to push me behind him again.

“GET AWAY FROM HER!” the Professor screeched. “OR I’ll FUCKING KILL HER!” His eyes were wild, and he swung wildly, training the gun back on me. I saw Bia and Lameuix exchange a quick, worried glance.

But a second later the professor moved back toward Noah, pressing the butt of the gun to Noah’s side. “I should give you a gut shot, watch your intestines pulse out of you,” he mumbled, almost to himself. “Or maybe I’ll make a tiny hole in your skull, and your brains will come dribbling out.”

I buried my face in my hands and sobbed, and then, suddenly, more hands were on me.

Bia.

Pulling me to my feet, surprisingly strong as she hauled me over to the side of the room where she and Lameuix had been standing.

Lameuix was still standing there smoking casually, as if he were a director letting his actors work on their craft without any input from him, as if we’d been allowed to adlib.

Mikayla had found a stool in the corner, and she was sitting on it, still holding her camera, filming the action.

My eyes met hers as Bia hustled me by.

She stared at me blankly, a tiny smile pasted on her lips.

Rage boiled inside of me, and I resisted the urge to punch her in the face.

“Hey,” the professor said when he saw Bia with me. “What are you doing? Let her go, I want her with me.”

Bia pulled my hands further behind my back, so far that I thought my arms might pull out of my sockets. “Watch it,” I spit. “You’re going to pull my arms out of their sockets.”

“Oh, that would be fun,” Mikayla said, sounding delighted. “We could take turns popping them back in.”

“Let her go,” Professor Worthington repeated to Bia. He moved away from Noah and back toward me, and now his gun was trained on Bia.

Lameuix and Bia looked at each other, the same look they’d given each other a moment ago, only now they seemed more concerned.

“Remember the plan, Colin,” Lameuix said through a cloud of cigar smoke. He ground out his cigar and turned toward the professor. “They’re both to be used in the film.”

They’re both to be used in the film.

Our torture film.

My eyes welled with tears and I turned and dry heaved. I could feel my dinner in my stomach, turning and churning, and I was sure I was going to throw up. But nothing came up, leaving me with a horrible, severe feeling of nausea that was unbearable.

Bia still had me by the arms, and she pulled me harder against her.

This wasn’t like that night at Force, when Noah came rushing in to save me. That night, he’d been out there looking for me. We were in a nightclub that, while dangerous, was filled with people and was located in one of the biggest cities in the world.

Now we were in the middle of nowhere, in a basement lair, outnumbered by insane people who also had weapons. And no one knew where we were.

I looked back up after I was finished dry heaving, but my vision was starting to go blurry around the edges. I was going to faint, I was pretty sure. My knees buckled, and I could feel Bia trying to haul me to my feet, but wasn’t working.

I could hear her trying to say something to me, to yell something at me, at the professor yelling at her, but I couldn’t focus on what anyone was saying.

And then my eyes met his.

Noah’s.

Standing on the other side of the basement, back where the professor had pushed me to the ground. His gaze was fixed on mine, and I saw him mouth the words, “Stay with me.”

It was like a electrical current. Everything came back into focus, my senses sharpening, the feeling of nausea starting to pass.

“We talked about this,” Lameuix was saying. His tone before had been calm, like he was explaining something to a child, but now he sounded markedly more annoyed. “This is how it’s going to go.”

“No, no, no!” Professor Worthington said. “Not Charlotte.”

“Colin, we need both of them,” Bia insisted. “If we let one of them live, there’s no point.”

“The point is that she stays with me,” Professor Worthington insisted, and my stomach turned again. I wasn’t sure what was worse -- ending up in one of their sick films where they tortured and killed me, or being sent off with Professor Worthington to be his prisoner. The former would be horrific, but it would probably only last a few hours. If I went with Professor Worthington, who knew how long I’d be with him? Days, months, years? Would he ever even be caught? He was smart and wily.

I heard a whimper and didn’t realize it was coming from me until Bia slapped my face. “Shut up.”

The slap snapped me back to reality, and my gaze fell back on Noah. He was staring at me intently, and I could tell her was trying to tell me something.

His eyes moved back and forth between Bia and the professor -- the two people who had guns.

And then I realized what he was trying to tell me.

They were distracted.

We needed to stay alert, because our only chance was that one of them would maybe let their guard down, would make a mistake or lose their way, giving us an opening to do something.

“Don’t touch her,” Professor Worthington said. “Don’t slap her like that!”

“Bentley, tell him,” Bia said to Lameuix. “Tell him Charlotte’s a part of this, too.”

“This was the plan, Colin. You know that. We never would have told you to come here if we didn’t think you were on board.” Lameuix’s voice was tight and controlled, as if he were trying to convince the professor to go in on a business deal in which the terms were non-negotiable.

Bia, on the other hand, was starting to get rattled.

I could tell from the shrillness in her voice.

And the professor was getting agitated. Not with Noah, but with Bia, especially after she hit me.

And then I had an idea.

I turned my head to the right and bit Bia’s shoulder as hard as I could.

“You fucking bitch!” she screeched, and hit me on the shoulder with the butt of gun. Searing pain exploding through my shoulder, and the strength of the blow was enough to send me falling to the ground.

As soon as I fell to my knees, I heard the sound of a gun going off.

And then a drop of blood appeared on the floor next to me.

I looked up to see Bia standing there, a bloodstain spreading on her chest, soaking her dress.

“I warned you,” the professor said. “I fucking warned you not to touch her.” He was so worked up he was drooling, and when he reached up to wipe his mouth with the back of his sleeve, Noah pounced.

He wrestled the professor to the ground, the two of them rolling around in a blur.

Next to me, Bia had fallen to the ground, struggling to stay conscious. The gun was gone from her hand, and my eyes scanned the floor wildly, searching for it.

“Awesome,” Mikayla murmured, turning her camera on Bia, whose eyes were wide and glassy as she began to bleed out, her blood forming a sticky halo around her body.

A second later, I spotted the gun in the corner.

Lameuix saw it at the same time, but I was able to get to it first, in part because I was closer, and in part because he was distracted about what was happening to Bia.

I picked it up, my hands shaking.

I’d never held a gun before, and it was heavier than I expected, the weight of it feeling serious and dangerous in my hand.

I whirled it around the room, pointing and swinging wildly.

“Jesus!” Lameuix said, holding his hands up.

I rushed to Noah, my feet slipping in Bia’s blood. Noah was still on the floor with the professor, but he’d gotten the better of him. I watched, the gun pointed at them, as Noah wrestled the gun away from Professor Worthington. The professor scrambled up and scuttled across the floor to the hidden door that led, I presumed, back up to the house. He skittered through it.

I pulled the trigger, aiming for him, but the bullet missed and hit the wall, lodging deep in the plaster.

Noah rushed to me. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” I said. “Yes, I’m okay.”

His eyes and hands traveled my body. “You’re not hurt?”

I followed his gaze to where a smear of blood darkened my forearm. The whole room smelled like blood know, the metallic smell permeating the air.

“It’s not my blood,” I said, as Noah wiped at it with his sleeve. “It’s hers.”

We looked back down on the floor to where Bia was. Noah knelt next to her, the knee of his pants becoming soaked with blood. Her eyes were wide open, like they’d been since she’d been shot, almost like her face had frozen into a permanent mask of surprise.

But her chest was no longer rising.

Noah picked up her wrist and checked her pulse.

He shook his head. “She’s dead.”

A strangled cry escaped my lips. She was dead. There was a dead body on the floor.

“Badass,” Mikayla said from the stool. Her camera was trained on Bia’s dead body, and I could hear the sound of the lens zooming in.

Mikayla was completely crazy. I wasn’t sure if she’d been that way at Force, or if whatever torture she’d endured while being in this underground prison had made her that way.

The room went silent for a moment.

From down the hall, behind the door that the professor had gone through, I could hear the rattling of metal, and the wail of females. The other women who were being kept here. How many of them were there?

“You killed my wife.” Lameuix’s voice broke the silence. He sounded stunned, but a moment later, he lunged for Noah. Noah held the gun out and trained it on him.

Lameuix stopped. His eyes glinted, but he looked dead inside, just like Mikayla. He looked like he wanted to kill Noah, like he wanted to rip him limb from limb. But it was born of something else, some sick need to hurt him instead of concern or revenge over his dead wife.

“Charlotte, go upstairs,” Noah said. “Take the gun you have with you and get my phone. In the front pocket of my suitcase are handcuffs and rope. Bring them down.” He glanced at me, taking in the fact that I was wearing just a tiny nightgown. “And get a sweatshirt.”

“No.” I shook my head. “I’m not leaving you.”

“It’s fine,” he said. “Nothing’s going to happen to me.”’

I hesitated, but then I realized he was right. We needed to get his phone, needed to call the police. And we couldn’t just leave Mikayla and Lameuix down here by themselves – there were too many secret passageways, too many ways for them to get away. Not to mention the professor. I had no idea where he’d gone or where he was.

I raced up the ladder that led back to the room we’d been staying in, then grabbed Noah’s phone off the nightstand. I took a sweatshirt from his suitcase, hastily pulling it over my nightgown and shoving my feet into a pair of sneakers. I found the handcuffs and rope, then headed back down to the cellar.

When I got there, no one had moved.

Noah still stood there, pointing the gun at Lameuix while Mikayla filmed the whole thing. I was suddenly thankful she had her camera trained on everyone, was thankful that there would now be a record of everything that had happened.

“Do you want to call the police, or should I?” I asked Noah.

He ignored me. “Charlotte, shut the cameras off.”

“What?”

“There’s a main switch over there.” He nodded his head toward the door, where an electrical box was located. Next to it I could see the main power switch.

“Noah –”

“Do what I say, Charlotte.”

I hurried over to the door and hit the switch. The recording equipment shut down, the monitors going dark as a heavy silence filled the air.

“Take the camera from her,” Noah said, indicting Mikayla.

“No,” Mikayla said, holding the camera close to her as if it were a prized possession.

I pointed my gun at her, my grip shaking. “Give it to me.”

“No.”

Rage bubbled up inside of me, a rage I had no idea I could possess. I’d always wondered what would happen if I were ever in a situation where I had to fight for my life, if I’d be capable of actually killing someone. Now I was pretty sure I could.

Because the rage that poured through my veins like a river, shocking in its intensity, was directed at Mikayla.

She was the whole reason I was in this situation.

I’d been stupid to come after her, stupid to think she could be trusted.

Because of her, I’d put everything at risk.

Noah was right, a voice in my head whispered. You should listened to him. It’s not Mikayla’s fault you’re in this situation, it’s because of your own stupidity.

I turned that thought off, focusing my rage directly on Mikayla as I slammed the butt of the gun down on her wrist, hard enough for it to hurt but not enough to leave any permanent damage. The camera fell to the ground, and I picked it up and shut it off.

I thought about smashing it into smithereens under my foot, but I wanted to make sure we kept any evidence we needed.

“Over there,” Noah commanded Lameuix and Mikayla. “On the ground, both of you.”

Mikayla sighed and slid off her stool, moved over to the side of the cellar where Noah had indicated she go and sat down on the ground.

“Fuck that,” Lameuix said. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Noah backhanded him hard across the face.

I gasped at the shock of the gesture. “Jesus, Noah,” I said. “Was that necessary?” We had the guns. We had a phone. It was time to call the police.

“Get. On. The. Floor,” Noah said to Lameuix, ignoring my question as he shoved the butt of the gun against Lameuix’s cheek. Lameuix held his hands up and walked over to the other side of the cellar. He sat down next to Mikayla.

“On your knees,” Noah commanded. “Both of you. Hands behind your back.”

They did as they were told.

“Tie her up,” Noah said to me.

“Noah –”

“Charlotte.”

I sprang into action with the rope I’d brought downstairs.

Noah tied up Lameuix as I tied up Mikayla, listening to Noah’s instructions, watching what he did. When we were finished, they were on their knees, their legs tied together, their hands tied and cuffed behind them. I stood up, my chest heaving with exertion.

Mikayla stared back at me, glassy-eyed, but Lameuix glared, defiant.

“Okay,” I said. “Now we can call the police.” Maybe we’d even get the hell out of here, go wait in the car or something. Staying down here was creeping me out, although I guessed we couldn’t really leave the two of them alone. We had guns and they were tied, but who knew what would happen if they left.

Not to mention Professor Worthington.

He could be anywhere.

The thought of him sent shivers up my spine, and I kept glancing behind me, making sure he wasn’t creeping up behind me.

On second thought, I decided, I’d rather be in here than out there.

But Noah wasn’t moving.

“Call the police,” I said. I was still holding the gun, and it still felt strange in my hand.

“Not yet,” Noah said, licking his lips. A tight smile played at the corners of his mouth. “Not until I get the truth.”

“What? What are you talking about?” I asked, as trepidation clawed at my stomach.

“I’m talking about figuring out what this sick fuck has to do with the Lilah Parks case,” Noah said. He reached out and ran the barrel of the gun down over Lameuix’s face.

“I thought you were supposed to be a brilliant legal mind, Cutler,” Lameuix spit. “Can’t you figure it out yourself?”

Noah punched him in the nose, so hard that blood spurted and ran down Lameuix’s face.

“Noah!” I ran to him and grabbed his arm. “Noah, stop. This is crazy. Please, we need to call the police.”

“Charlotte, go upstairs.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head vehemently. “What are you going to do, Noah? Torture him until he gives you the answers you want?”

Noah stood up and gazed down at Lameuix, whose eyes now had the unfocused look of someone who was about to go unconscious.

“Yes, Charlotte,” Noah said, the tone of his voice sending shivers up my spine. “That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”

* * *

And that’s exactly what he did.

He punched him, kicked him in the stomach, worked him over, threatened him with the gun until Lameuix was gasping for breath.

Mikayla was slumped against the wall, and she giggled like a crazy person as she watched the violence. The smell of blood in the air intensified, permeating the room so heavily I felt as if I could taste it.

Fifteen minutes passed.

Half an hour.

My throat went hoarse from begging Noah to stop, from pleading with him not to do this, to let me call the police. But I’d given him the phone and there was no way I was getting it back.

Lameuix had been adamant from the beginning that he wasn’t going to talk, that no amount of torture could make him, and I was starting to believe it.

“Please, Noah,” I said. “Please, stop. You have to stop.”

“Listen to your bitch, Noah,” Lameuix said, spitting a mouthful of blood onto the floor. “Stop.”

“Fuck you,” Noah said, and kicked him in the stomach.

“Please,” I said. “Please, stop, you’re going to kill him. Is that what you want? To kill him? You’ll go to jail, Noah, is that what you want? To be away from me?” This seemed to get through to him and he stopped for a moment, but I could see in his eyes that he wasn’t going to stop.

“Get me the lighter, Charlotte,” he said. “From on the work bench.”

“What? Absolutely not, Noah, this is fucking crazy, please.”

He ignored me and walked over to the workbench and grabbed the lighter. He returned to Lameuix, and held the flame to Lameuix’s arm.

Lameuix screamed.

“Okay, okay!” he pleaded. “Okay. I’ll tell you.”

“Talk,” Noah said, pulling back, the glow of the flame still burning in the dim room. “And hurry up.”

“The girls from Force are in the back,” Lameuix said. “What Mikayla said is right. We brought them here to make movies.”

“Of you raping and killing them,” Noah clarified.

“Yes.”

My hand flew to my mouth at the horror of the words. It could have been me. I could have been back there in a cage, waiting for them to come and get me, to get me ready for my scene. They would have dominated me, would have tortured me and then killed me, filmed the whole thing. Or would I have been kept alive by Professor Worthington, to use as his special pet?

“What does Worthington have to do with it?” Noah demanded.

“He had the connection to Force, he helped us get the girls.”

“And Lilah Parks?”

Lameuix groaned, and slumped over at the waist. He was having trouble breathing. I was pretty sure Noah had broken one of his ribs. “She was one of them.”

“Lilah Parks was one of the girls from Force?” Noah asked.

“Yes. But she was also helping us.”

I knew what that meant. Lilah was more like Mikayla than the girls I could hear screaming down the hall. She was one of them, one of the ones who got special treatment and helped them do the filming. One of the ones who thought she wanted this.

“And Josh Aquilino?” Noah asked, naming the man Lilah was accused of killing.

“He was one of us. He was helping us, but he… he started asking too many questions, started poking around, started letting his conscience get the best of him. Worthington was sure Josh was going rogue, thought maybe he was about to go to the police, maybe cut a deal. So we made a deal with Lilah. Kill him, and we’d do everything we could to get her off.”

“And if she refused?”

“Then she’d have to star in her own film.”

“Jesus,” I breathed.

Noah shook his head as all the pieces locked into place. “So you made sure that I was her defense lawyer. You wanted Lilah to do your dirty work. That’s why you got Bella to pose for those photos, so that Lilah’s story of self-defense would make more sense.”

“It doesn’t take a fucking genius to figure it out, Noah, you dumb fuck,” Lameuix said. He’d seemed to have gotten control of his breathing now, and he smiled up at Noah. His teeth were covered in blood, making him look a grotesque clown.

My stomach turned.

There was so much blood. Everywhere.

I was so nauseous.

“We had you running all over the city, looking for leads, and the whole time we were controlling everything,” Lameuix crowed. “You were nothing but a fucking puppet.”

Noah shoved Lameuix to the ground, then pressed his foot against Lameuix’s windpipe.

“Noah,” I said. “Please. He told you everything. Just stop.” I was pleading now, my voice shrill.

“Beg, motherfucker,” Mikayla said from the corner. She giggled again, a horrible high-pitched sound that echoed through my brain.

“Noah, please,” I said for what felt like the millionth time. I grabbed his arm and pulled at his body, but he wouldn’t listen. He was in a different place, somewhere I couldn’t reach him. His strong frame, normally like granite, was even more immoveable now. “Noah, please!”

“Worthington,” he barked at Lameuix. “Where is he?”

“How the fuck should I know?” Lameuix managed to gasp.

“Best guess,” Noah said, and stepped on him harder.

“The boat house,” Lameuix wheezed. “In the back woods.”

Noah applied more pressure to Lameuix’s windpipe with his foot, and I watched as Lameuix’s eyes bugged and his face began to turn purple. Noah was going to kill him.

“Noah! Please, Noah, you’re going to kill him!”

Finally, Noah pulled his foot off Lameuix’s throat.

Lameuix gasped for air as his face started regaining back of its normal color.

I let go of Noah’s arm. My legs were spaghetti, and I fell to the floor.

Noah pulled out his phone and called 911.

* * *

The police came, their sirens flashing and brakes screeching as they skidded into the long driveway. I waited for them by the front door of the house while Noah stayed behind, guarding Lameuix and Mikayla.

I led the police to the guest room and into the bathroom, pointed them down the ladder, but I didn’t go back down there, couldn’t make myself face what had happened down there. I didn’t want to see more blood or violence or hear Mikayla’s insane laugh or her dead eyes.

I waited for Noah to come upstairs, but he didn’t.

They kept him down there, I wasn’t sure for what, but eventually, they led me outside and put me into the back of a police car.

I watched out the window of the cruiser as the cops kept coming by what seemed like the dozen, more and more being called as they realized there was a dead body in the cellar, that two people were tied up, that there were women in cages being kept underground against their will.

The police blended into one big blur of faces and badges.

One of them brought me a bottle of water.

One of them brought me a blanket.

One of them turned the radio on for me, even though the last thing I wanted to do was listen to music.

At one point there was a commotion in the woods near the back of the house, and officers went running. I heard the sound of gunshots, and I tried to get out of the car, but I couldn’t.

When an officer came back to check on me, I asked her what had happened.

She hesitated. “Colin Worthington,” she said. “He was hiding in a boathouse back there.”

“Did you get him?” I asked, holding my breath.

“Yes. We got him.”

“Alive?”

“Yes.” She refused to say anything more.

A little while later they took me to the police station, where they gave me coffee and interrogated me. They wouldn’t let me see Noah, not until I’d told them everything I knew.

It took hours.

Hours and hours of answering the same questions over and over.

I felt like I was in a fog.

I didn’t even think of trying to lie. There was nothing to lie about, except for maybe why we’d been there in the first place. I told them that we’d gone to see Lameuix about a case we’d been handling, to talk to him because of the tattoo we’d seen on Bella’s back.

I didn’t mention anything about how Professor Worthington had been the reason we’d gone there, that Noah had tried to lure him there so Noah could kill him.

I didn’t say anything about Noah torturing Lameuix.

They asked me briefly how Lameuix had gotten a broken rib and a broken nose. I told them it must have happened in the struggle for the gun, and they accepted this and moved on pretty quickly.

I was sure that they weren’t going to dig too deeply into how a man who’d been keeping women as slaves got his injuries.

After what felt like forever, I asked to see Noah.

They made me wait longer, and told me he was still being questioned.

When they finally let me go, he was waiting for me in the waiting room of the police station.

He was wearing a navy sweatshirt they must have given him and the same pajama pants he’d been in when I’d last seen him.

His eyes were bright and his face was scrubbed of any blood or sign of what had happened, except for a huge bruise that was blooming under his eye right above his right cheekbone.

We stood there, staring at each other, and my eyes filled with tears.

Then I ran to him.

He wrapped his arms around me and I began to cry.

“Shhh, baby,” he soothed, his voice against my ear. “Shh, it’s okay. You’re okay, everything’s okay. You’re okay, we’re here.”

His voice was like a balm on my soul, the melodic cadence instantly calming me like he always did.

“I want to go home,” I said.

He took my hand and brought me home.

* * *

A day passed.

Then two.

The two of us became ghosts, floating through our lives. We didn’t talk about what happened. We didn’t talk about much of anything.

Noah had become withdrawn and seemingly out-of-sorts. He was short when he talked and quiet most of the time.

On our second night home, I woke in the middle of the night to find him gone from our bed. This in and of itself wasn’t that strange -- Noah often went to his home office to work, even at all hours.

Docket was at the end of the bed, curled up and sleeping soundly. I was thankful he was so relaxed, even with all of the tension in the apartment, and also a little envious that my life couldn’t be as simple as his.

The light was on in the master bathroom, and the door was open.

I could hear the sound of Noah rummaging around in there.

I got up and padded to the bathroom.

He was standing in front of the medicine cabinet, dressed in a pair of navy athletic shorts and a fitted grey T that clung to his chiseled muscles. Even in the middle of the night, even with the bruise on his face and everything we’d been through, he was still the sexiest man I’d ever seen.

“What are you doing?” I asked gently. “It’s three in the morning.”

“Good, you’re up,” he said, as if it was noon and I’d been sleeping in. “I’m going for a run.”

“At this time of night?” I shook my head. “Noah, that’s insane. Come on, come back to bed.”

“Get dressed.” He walked out of the bathroom past me. He’d left a mess of everything that had been in the cabinets. Shampoo and face treatments and bottles of shaving cream were strewn across the counter. In the middle of it all was the purple container that held my birth control pills. He must have been counting them, making sure I was taking them.

I remembered what he’d said on the plane on our way to see Lameuix, about how he was having thoughts of impregnating me and how no matter what, it was important that he didn’t.

“Noah,” I said, following him into the bedroom.

He was at my dresser, pulling out a pair of yoga pants and a hoodie.

“Here.” He handed them to me. “Get dressed.”

“Where are we going?”

“I told you, I’m going for a run.” He was sitting on the bed now, slipping his feet into his sneakers.

“What does that have to do with me?”

“You will wait outside.”

“What?”

“In the limo. It’s parked outside, guarded by security.” As soon as we’d gotten back from upstate, Noah had fired everyone on our current security detail and hired a brand new team. If I’d thought the other team had been scary, I’d had no idea.

These new guys were serious. All ex-FBI or CIA, their eyes dead from the horrors they’d seen. They all carried guns and wore black glasses and looked as if they’d been sent straight over from central casting.

“You want me to wait in a limo outside while you go for a run?” I repeated, confused.

“Yes.”

“That’s crazy.” I shook my head. “Why can’t I just stay here?” I wanted to ask why he had to go for a run at three in the morning in the first place, but I was pretty sure I already knew the answer. He was filled with anxiety about what had happened. He wanted to go for a run to work out whatever it was that was inside of him.

“Because I need to know you’re safe.”

“I’ll be safe here,” I said.

“I won’t be able to see you.”

“How will you be able to see me when I’m sitting in a limo if you’re going to be running?”

“I’m taking a specific route. Now get dressed. I will not ask you again.” His eyes glinted and I knew what he was talking about. If I didn’t do what he said, there’d be punishments. I was almost tempted to rebel, if only because my body craved his. He hadn’t touched me since we’d been home, and I wanted him, wanted his lips on me, his hands, his belt.

I sighed as he turned and walked out of the room.

What was he talking about, a certain route? I thought as I shed my pajamas and pulled on the yoga pants and sweatshirt. He couldn’t possibly mean he was going to run around the block or something, did he? That was insane.

“Charlotte.” His voice came from the front hallway, rough and demanding.

“Yes, I’m coming.”

I grabbed my iPad off the nightstand.

I was wide awake now, and if I was going to be stuck sitting in a car while Noah ran around the block like a crazy person, I figured I should at least have something to occupy my time.

* * *

He was beautiful when he ran, his form perfect, the muscles in his legs rippling and clenching, his body moving through the quiet, middle-of-the-night streets of New York exactly how he moved through life, with purpose and intent, making it look effortless.

Every time he went by he glanced at the limo, making sure I was okay, even though there was a security guard standing outside with a sidearm.

The security guard had close-cropped blond hair and a nose that looked as if it had been broken a few times. I’d asked Noah his name, but Noah had insisted I not know anything personal about the security detail – even their names – since he thought it bred a familiarity that might make it impossible for them to do their jobs.

After about forty-five minutes, Noah stopped making his laps around the block and slid into the limo next to me.

He reached into the center console and pulled out a bottle of water and took a long pull.

He reached behind him and pulled off his shirt, using it to wipe the sweat from his brow. The muscles and skin of his body glistened with exertion.

God, he was so fucking sexy.

“Can we go inside now?” I asked.

He glanced at me. “They’re checking the apartment.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I’m not one for kidding, Charlotte.”

“No kidding.”

“Funny.” But he didn’t laugh. Instead, he took another sip of water and glanced at the screen on my iPad. I had my internet browser open, and I’d been googling law schools in New York. “What are you looking at?”

“I was just…I’m thinking that it’s probably not the best idea to go back to Middleton. I’ll be behind, but I just… I don’t think I can do it.” I wasn’t even sure I could get into another school – there was the problem of the disciplinary hearing that had been called about my situation with Noah, not to mention all the horrible things that had happened to me that were connected to Professor Worthington. But I couldn’t go back to Milddleton, either. Not after everything that had happened.

“It’s a good idea,” Noah said. “That school is bullshit. I should sue them and get them shut down.”

“For what?”

“For putting you in danger.” He took another sip of his water and glared out the window. I stared at him for a moment, trying to figure out if he really thought he had the power to get an entire school shut down just because he thought they’d put me in danger. After a second I decided that he did.

“Yeah, well, I’m not even sure I can get into another school,” I said. “Because of the disciplinary hearing.”

“The disciplinary hearing is a moot point now that Lameuix has been arrested.” He’d told me this already, that now that Lameuix was in jail, there was no reason for whoever had reported me to the disciplinary committee to move forward with their complaint. I’d found the girls from Force, and trying to stop me from doing that had been their reason for trying to get me thrown out of school in the first place.

Noah also seemed to think that now that the professor had been found and arrested, that it was now clear that he’d been following me, that the police would drop the idea that I was the one who had killed Jason Cartwright. I was inclined to believe him, since I hadn’t heard from them since I’d been back in New York.

“I just need a new start,” I said. “I’m going to go down to Middleton tomorrow to talk to them about withdrawing and make sure everything’s settled with the hearing.”

Noah took the iPad and angled it toward him. “NYU?” he asked when he saw the home page on the screen. “Why not Columbia?”

“I don’t know if I could get into Columbia. They don’t take many transfer students.”

“I know the head of admissions. I’ll make a call.”

“No.” I reached out and took the iPad away from him, a little rougher than I’d intended. “I mean, I want to get in on my own.”

“Fine. Columbia is a too far, anyway. And NYU is perfectly acceptable.”

“I don’t mind taking the subway to Columbia.”

“You wouldn’t take the subway, Charlotte, you would take a car.”

Oh. Right. I was still having trouble getting used to the fact that in Noah’s world, money meant nothing. I wondered if I would ever get used to it, if when I was his wife and half of his fortune was legally mine, if I would still have the urge to ride subways, if I could stop myself from constantly calculating how much it cost to have a car service on call 24/7.

“And besides, it has nothing to do with the car,” Noah went on. “A trip that far uptown would be a logistical nightmare for security.” His phone buzzed from the pocket of his shorts. He pulled it out and scrolled through an email, typing a reply while muttering something about people being inept.

“Wait, what would be a challenge for security?” I asked, not sure I’d understood.

“Keeping tabs on you at Columbia.”

My mouth dropped. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

He sent his email, the whoosh sound from his phone echoing through the car. “Relax, Charlotte. If your heart is set on Columbia, I will work it out. You don’t have to worry.”

“I’m not worried about Columbia, Noah, I’m worried about the fact that you assume a security detail is going to be following me to a new school.” I was leaving Middleton to hopefully leave behind the fact people might know my history—showing up at a new school with a security detail was like having a big neon arrow pointing at me that flashed GIRL WITH BAGGAGE.

“I’m not assuming anything, Charlotte. It’s non-negotiable.”

I started to get out of the car, but he reached over and grabbed my hips, pulling me back down on the seat.

His dark eyes blazed with hunger. He hadn’t touched me since we’d gotten back from upstate, and I knew he must have been pent up. His need to dominate me must have been at an all-time high. Usually he needed to take his emotions out on me sexually a couple of times a day. “You know my first priority is to keep you safe. Always.” His hands tightened around my waist as if to illustrate his point.

“But I am safe. There’s no one after me anymore. Professor Worthington is in jail. Bia’s dead, Lameuix is in jail. Everything is on tape. They won’t be getting out for a very long time.”

“He got out once, he can get out again.”

“Noah.” I reached up and touched his face. “Please, Noah, I just want things to be normal.” I craved it. This was finally our chance. The Lilah Parks case was over. Noah had reported everything he knew about it to the police, then recused himself. Colin Worthington was in jail. Lameuix was in jail, Bia was dead, the girls had been released. It was our one chance for a normal life. “Please, let’s go inside.” I started to get out of the car again, but he pulled me back to him.

“This will never be normal, Charlotte. The way I feel about you, the way you make me feel is not normal.” His voice was ragged and rough, and it brushed over my skin like warm sandpaper, leaving me tingling and wanting.

“I get that,” I said. He was obsessed with me, and I with him. We wouldn’t ever be normal, not after everything we’d been through together, our scars and history, past and present, that bound us together like an invisible tether. “But we need to move on at least a little bit. I want to marry you, to start our lives together.”

His eyes shone with emotion, and I reached up and ran my fingertips over the strong muscles of his bare shoulders.

“Please,” I said.

“I keep thinking about how I brought you there,” he said, his hands moving from my waist and tightening around my forearms. “It was my fault you were in danger.”

“No, it wasn’t your fault,” I said. “And now it’s over. Reliving it over and over isn’t going to help anything.”

He reached up and smoothed a strand of hair back from my face.

“Please,” I said. “You can’t control everything, Noah. It’s impossible.”

“I can’t let you get hurt again.”

“I can’t be stifled, Noah. I can’t start a new school with security following me around. What’s the point?”

“The point is that you’ll be safe.”

“The point is that it will make me a freak! If you’re going to have security following me around, there’s no point of even starting a new school.”

“That’s the way it is.” He said it so matter-of-fact that it infuriated me.

I tried to slide away from him, but he grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me back to him, his lips sealing over mine. His tongue pushed past my resistance, his tongue tangling and dancing against mine. He held the back of my head and deepened the kiss.

I tried to pull away, but I knew it was useless.

When he finally ended the kiss, he continued to hold the back of my head, his tongue tracing a searing trail over my throat. He stared into my eyes, and my breath came in short gasps.

I ran my hands up over the back of his neck, over the spot where his hair met the smooth skin. We gazed into each other’s eyes as the emotions between us flamed and burned. I loved him so much I could barely take it.

“I love you,” I whispered. “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too,” he said roughly, and the words caused my nipples to peak and my pussy to thrum.

And then, just like that, he was done behind soft. He grabbed me and flipped me over on the seat, before tugging my yoga pants and panties down until they rested just below the curve of my ass.

He spanked me, just once, the blow so sharp it stung.

“Please, Noah,” I said, my eyes filling with hot tears.

“Is this what you want, baby?” he demanded. “Does this feel normal?”

He spanked me again, the flesh of my ass jiggling with the intensity. He grabbed my ass cheek and shook it after striking me again.

I moaned through my tears.

“That’s what I thought,” he said, his voice matter-of-fact. He laid down on top of me, pressing his hard body to mine. He grabbed my hair and pulled it hard, his mouth slanting against mine again as he kissed me again. He moaned into my mouth, the vibration causing me to moan back, leaving me breathless.

“This is what’s normal for us, baby. You under me, taking a spanking. Your pussy getting wet from the pain. You are submissive to me. I own you, and this is what’s normal. Do you understand?”

“Noah,” I groaned. I wanted to talk, but I could feel myself melting under his touch, melting under his dirty words and his touch.

“Do you understand?” He tugged on my hair again.

“Yes, sir. Yes, I understand.”

“Good girl.”

He pulled back from me, giving my ass one final, stinging slap with his open palm before reaching under me and flipping me back over on the seat so that I was on my back.

He straddled me and ran his hands over my body, grabbing my breasts through my sweatshirt, lifting the weight in his hand and squeezing gently.

He pushed my hands up over my head and then ran his hands over my body.

“God, I want to tie you up,” he murmured. His voice was low and heavy, and I watched him over me, shirtless, the golden skin of his bare chest glimmering in the small amount of light that shown in through the windows of the limo. His body was a work of art, every line, every muscle, every tendon seemingly carved from stone.

He held my wrists up over my head.

“Charlotte,” he whispered. “Fuck, Charlotte.” Then he released me. “Take off your sweatshirt.”

I pulled it off, my nipples instantly hardening under the sheer fabric of my bra. He might have had a need to dominate me, but I had a need to be dominated, to be spanked and punished. I needed him to do this to me just as much as he needed to do it to me, and no matter how much I fought against my urges, it was always a losing battle.

He gazed down at me, then leaned down and brushed his lips over mine so gently I could barely feel them. I raised my head up, greedy for him, wanting his tongue in my mouth, his lips on mine.

But he pulled away, kissing over my chin, down over my neck, his tongue swirling gently around my pulse point. I gasped and tilted my head back, giving him access to my body.

His breath skated over my cleavage, down over my rib cage, over my stomach. I arched my back, but he held me down roughly against the seat.

“Stay still.”

“I can’t.”

“You will.”

“Noah.”

He ignored my protests and I gathered my self-control and kept my hips on the seat, even as his thumbs dipped low under the waistband of my yoga pants. My fists clenched at my sides and I bit my lip, willing myself not to move. Defiance would not make him give me what I wanted any faster – in fact, it would most likely only prolong the torture.

He began to pull my pants down, slowly over my hips, the whole time following their descent with his mouth, kissing under my navel, my thighs, my knees.

When he finally finished removing them, he kissed the arch of my foot and gazed down at me, spread out for him in just my bra and panties.

“Jesus,” he murmured. “Look at your tits.”

He cupped them through my bra, his thumbs moving over my nipples until they were rock hard. His movements were rough, but his touch was feather light. He held my tits in his hands, squeezing roughly, but his fingertips barely brushed the tight peaks of my nipples.

The contradiction between the two sensations drove me crazy, and before I knew it, I was arching my back again.

“Naughty girl,” Noah breathed, his hands still kneading my breasts.

He slid his hands down my sides and hooked his thumbs in the sides of my panties, then pulled the elastic and let it go until it zinged against my skin. The movement tugged my panties down just enough to expose the top of my mound.

A strangled whimper escaped my lips, and I reached behind me and gripped the handle on the limo door, my fingers digging into the leather.

Noah loosened the cups of my bra just a little bit, pulling on them until my nipples popped free. He rolled them gently between his fingers, and I arched my back again, wanting his hands and mouth all over me.

This earned me a hard slap against my tit, and I cried out.

“Stay still.”

“Please.”

“Please what?”

“Please…” my voice was a breathless whisper, and I couldn’t even finish the sentence, because I wasn’t even sure what I wanted. All I knew was that I wanted more of this, more of him – his hands, his mouth, his cock, his kiss.

“Please what?”

“More.”

“Like this?” His hands came back to my panties, and he pulled the sides down just a tiny bit more, until more of my mound was exposed. “So smooth,” he murmured, bending down to kiss it.

I arched up into him, and he slapped my panty-covered pussy.

“I don’t want to have to tie you, but I will,” he said. Then he looked down at me, the glint in his eye deepening. “Actually, that’s not true at all. I do want to tie you, but I’m willing to give you a chance.”

“I’ll be good.”

“Will you?” he asked, sounding like he didn’t quite believe it.

He straddled me and our eyes met as he returned to the straps of my bra, tugging them down just an inch. When he was done, he moved back to the sides of my panties, pulling those down an inch, too.

He moved back at forth from my panties to my bra, undressing me excruciatingly slowly.

I stared up at him, at the perfection of his body, the chiseled and ripped planes of his chest, the bulge of his biceps, the sharp hills and valleys of his six-pack. My eyes lingered on him, following the trail of hair that started at this belly button and disappeared into this shorts. I could feel him hard against me, and I couldn’t believe that I was able to make this perfect, beautiful man so excited and turned on.

When he was finally done pulling my arms from the straps of my bra, I shivered. It was one of those bras that hooked in the front, and when he unhooked it, my breasts sprung free.

I watched him eye me hungrily.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” he moaned. “Do you know how hard your body gets me?”

I shook my head no, because I wanted him to do exactly what he did next. He took my hand and placed it on the front of his shorts, and I rubbed his hard cock through the fabric, enjoying the weight of it in my hand.

“Take my dick out.”

I reached into his shorts and pulled it out. His cock was beautiful, hard and thick with a perfect head. A drop of precum glistened on the crown, and I reached out and touched it with my finger, spreading it down his shaft.

Then I brought my hand to my mouth and spit on it.

I moved my hand up and down, giving him a slow, slippery hand job as his hands kneaded my bare breasts.

“Fuck,” he groaned as I stroked him. “Fuck, baby, yes, just like that. Good girl.”

I stroked him as more of his precum spurted from his swollen head, and I spit on my hand again. Our fluids mixed together as I jerked him off, making sure to squeeze him at the root of his dick and move my hand gently over the head before repeating doing it again.

He grew harder in my hand, and I began to move faster, stroking, squeezing. Our gazes moved in tandem, first locking on each other’s eyes, then moving to where he was playing with my tits, then finally down to his cock in my hand. When my eyes were on his, I could feel the physical attraction we shared in my soul. When my eyes moved to my breasts, I loved that his hands were so big, making me feel small and delicate as he rolled my nipples and palmed my tits. And when I saw his hard cock in my hand, I loved watching it grow harder by the second, loved watching him pulse and tremor, knowing his load was building, loved anticipating its release.

“Shit, I’m going to cum if you keep doing that,” Noah ground out.

We kept our eyes locked on the hand job I was giving him, watching as I stroked him.

Finally, he grabbed my wrist and stopped me.

He pushed my arms up roughly over my head.

“No,” I whimpered, protesting as he reached into the console and pulled out a pair of handcuffs. He cuffed me to the handle of the car door.

Then he lowered his mouth to mine and kissed me, our tongues swirling around each other. I longed to run my fingers through his hair, and the fact that I couldn’t touch him, couldn’t let my hands roam over his hard body, was enough to drive me out of my mind with frustration.

He moved down my body like he’d done before, this time letting his lips touch my skin, sucking each of my nipples between his lips, rolling his tongue around before biting them softly.

I groaned when he got to my panties and finished pulling them off.

When I was naked, he grabbed my under both my knees and pushed them to my chest.

My pussy spread with the movement, my clit pushing from its hood.

“You have the prettiest little pussy.”

My sex pounded with need, so strong I wondered if he could see it.

“You like being spread like this?” he demanded.

“Yes, sir.”

“You like showing me that pretty pink pussy?”

“Yes, sir.”

He lowered his mouth to my slick folds and ran his tongue around my spread hole.

“Noah.”

“Charlotte,” he whispered. “Damn, you taste good.” He began to eat me out, giving my pussy a deep French kiss with his tongue, moving over my smooth mound.

His tongue slid over my clit, soft and slow.

“Please,” I begged.

He moved down to the pucker of my asshole, and I gasped as his tongue swirled around it softly before returning to my pussy.

He pushed his tongue inside, rubbing against all my most sensitive spots.

“I need to fuck you,” he groaned. He pushed a finger inside of me and then got on top of me, shedding his shorts as he went.

His cock was right in front of my pussy, still glistening with the mixture of precum and saliva I’d used to stroke him off.

He rubbed my clit with three fingers and began to slide his dick over my spread slit, the head of his cock hitting my sensitive sex but never penetrating me. The sensation was the best kind of tease. I wanted him inside of me and yet I knew that I could come just like this if he kept it up.

“That tight little cunt is so wet.”

“Yes.”

“My bad little girl,” he ground out as he rocked his hips over me, using my slit to get himself off. “Are you my bad little girl?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Say it.”

“I’m your bad little girl.”

As the dirty words let my lips he began to move faster over my spread pussy, the rock hard head of his cock nudging against my clit, rubbing over the primed tissue.

The nasty words he was making me say, mixed with being tied up as the velvety feel of his cock pushed against me caused my orgasm build inside of me, threatening to overtake me.

“Noah,” I moaned. “Noah, I’m going to come on your cock.” I wasn’t sure what I was going to do if he said I couldn’t come yet. There was no way I could stop it. It was like an earthquake, the tectonic plates shifting and sliding over each other. But Noah was in the mood to be generous.

“Come baby. Come on my dick. Yes, just like that.” He looked down, watching as my pussy began to beat. “Shit, I can feel it. I can feel you coming on me, baby, your clit is throbbing.”

He slid over my slit harder and faster, the slippery friction building until my orgasm peaked. As soon it finished I was coming again, wave after wave of pleasure radiating from my pussy and curling my toes.

“That’s it,” he murmured, watching me. “You look so beautiful when you come like that, baby, that’s it, let yourself go.”

I surrendered to him and this time, when I pushed my hips up to meet his, he let me, holding me as he slid his dick over my clit.

When he came, he came on my stomach, and I watched the cum spurt out of the head of his dick, the warmth coating my skin, the sight of it causing me to come again.

When we’d finally finished, he kissed me softly until we’d both caught our breath. Then he laid down next to me, murmuring my name, stroking my hair until my limbs weren’t jelly anymore and the only thing I could think about was how much I loved him.

* * *

I fell into a deep sleep once we returned to the apartment, but I wasn’t sure if Noah had slept at all. When I woke at seven am, he was gone, and although he’d laid down with me the night before, I couldn’t tell if he’d spent much time in bed, or if he’d been up working.

Docket barked at me from the floor, then jumped up for a pet, turning onto his back and looking at me with hopeful eyes. I ran my hand over his fur and scratched his stomach as he licked my hand and panted happily.

Noah appeared in the doorway, a steaming cup of coffee in his hand.

He was shirtless, wearing just a pair of black lounge pants that hung low on his hips. “Morning,” he said, setting the coffee down on the nightstand for me before planting a quick kiss on my cheek.

“Morning.”

He walked into the bathroom, although he left the door open. He started the shower and then returned to our bedroom, where he picked up his phone and plugged it into the charger on the nightstand.

“Did Docket go out?” I asked as Docket’s tail wagged happily against the bed.

“Yes, I took him about half an hour ago.”

“Okay. Are you… are you going into the office today?”

He hadn’t gone in since we’d gotten back from Lameuix’s, but there was something different in his mannerisms this morning, as if he was back to business.

“Yes. I’ll work in the office here until you’re ready.”

“Until I’m ready for what?”

“You’re coming with me.”

“I can’t,” I said, picking up the cup of coffee and taking a sip. It was black, the way Noah insisted was best, and I tried not to wrinkle my nose at the bitter taste. I wasn’t even sure I liked coffee, black or not, but Noah insisted that all lawyers needed to drink coffee, so I’d been giving it a try. “Remember I told you last night that I was going down to school to make sure everything was set with my disciplinary hearing?”

“I told you that would be cancelled.” Noah stared at me, his eyes boring into mine, his face impassive. His tone of voice, as always, made it seem like there would be no compromise on the issue.

“I know,” I said. “But this is important. I need to go down and make sure. I also want to talk about formerly withdrawing from Middleton so that when I start applying to transfer schools I won’t have a bunch of incompletes on my transcript.”

He sighed. “I wish you would let me talk to someone at NYU. My connection there would be happy to -- ”

“No.” I shook my head. “No, I need to do this myself.” I stared him down, my eyes never leaving his, letting him know this was important to me. I’d worked hard to get into Middleton, and if I was going to withdraw because of things that weren’t even my fault, like Professor Worthington, then I was going to make sure that whatever school I got into was going to take me because of my merits, not because I happened to be sleeping with a powerful man.

“Fine. I can take you down there tomorrow,” Noah said. “But today I have meetings I can’t get out of.”

“I can go by myself.”

“No,” he said. “You can’t.”

“Yes, I can. And I will. I’ll go, then I’ll come back here and take Docket out, then I’ll come down and meet you for lunch.” I was sure to make it clear that I was meeting him for lunch, not that I was going to come down there and stay with him in his office for hours until it was time to go home.

I wasn’t his prisoner.

Professor Worthington was in jail. So was Lameuix. The girls from Force were free. At least, as free as they could be. I shivered, thinking about Mikayla, her eyes so empty. I wondered where she was and what was happening to her.

“Charlotte –“

“Noah,” I said brattily.

His eyes blazed. “Fine. But I’ll drop you off and then you’ll take the car, no subways or taxis. You’ll have your phone with you at all times so I can keep track of you.” Noah had put a tracker on my phone, and apparently it was still there. “You will text me every half hour, and respond to any texts I send you immediately.”

“Agreed.”

He kissed me on the lips, then got up and headed for the shower.

I laid there in bed for a few moments. I was happy that he’d agreed to let me go down to Middleton, but something still felt unsettled inside of me.

For the next few minutes, I kept replaying the scene at Lameuix’s over and over again, but not the stuff that had happened in the basement lair.

Instead, I remembered what Noah had said about not wanting to get me pregnant. I thought of the birth control pills I’d seen out on the counter in the bathroom. I remembered last night in the limo, how he’d made me come without ever going inside of me, and I wondered what this new wrinkle in his psyche was about.

Maybe I was overreacting.

But now that the thought had entered my mind, I was desperate to have him inside of me, missed the way his hard dick felt filling me, stretching me around his girth. I was too tight for him, but he always found a way to make sure I took him all the way.

I got up and walked into the bathroom.

The shower in the master bath was huge, spanning one side of the entire length of the bathroom.

I watched him through the glass door of the shower as he stood under the spray. He was resting his head against the tile wall, letting the hot water bead off his back. The room was filled with steam that swirled around him, and I took a moment to admire his body through the mist, the musculature of his thighs, the lean lines of his torso, the tight curve of his ass. God, he was beautiful. He could have been an athlete or a model. Masculinity and testosterone radiated from him, and I sucked in a breath through my teeth as desire flamed in my lower belly and settled between my legs.

I was wearing only his t-shirt, which he’d dressed me in last night, and I pulled it off and stepped into the spray behind him.

He must have known I was there, but he didn’t move.

I put my hand on his shoulder until he turned around.

For a moment, I saw the torment in his eyes, and I wished so badly he would let me in, wished so much he would tell me some of the things that burned inside of him, wished he would let me soothe his wounds and take care of him the way he took care of me.

Now that this nightmare was over, I was hoping he would let me do all of those things.

“Noah,” I whispered. “Are you okay?”

He didn’t answer for a long moment, and I was thinking, hoping, praying that he would let me in. Something passed between us, a connection of sorts that I hadn’t felt from him before.

“Is it… are you thinking about what happened?”

He shook his head. “No. Yes, of course I’m thinking about it, but I’m fine.”

“Then what is it?” I reached up and pushed the hair back from his face, letting my hands slide down the back of his head and over his shoulders. His skin was smooth, flawless, the muscles chiseled and defined, but I could feel the tension there, the knots and tightness under the surface.

I swallowed. “Why aren’t we fucking?”

He looked up sharply. “What are you talking about?”

“Last night, you didn’t go inside of me, you didn’t… and then before, that thing you said about not getting me pregnant. Is there something that’s –“

He cut me off, grabbing me hard around the waist, pulling me to him and kissing me on the mouth.

The kiss was ferocious, his tongue wasting no time as it pushed past my lips and invaded my mouth. My sex pulsed as the head of his cock pushed against it.

When he finally released me, I took a step back, hoping that putting some distance between us would allow us both to calm down enough for us to talk. He’d been on the verge of telling me something, I could feel it.

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I want to talk.”

He stood there with his back to the spray, looking like a hunter about to jump on his prey. His eyes burned with desire and want, his gaze moving over my naked body hungrily.

“You want to know why I didn’t fuck you last night?”

“Yes,” I whispered, but even as I was saying it, warning bells were going off in my head. Did I want to know? I wasn’t sure. I’d spent all this time always pushing him, always trying to figure out his secrets, figure out why he was the way he was. But now I wondered if part of that was because I knew there was no way he was ever going to tell me.

He was battered, bruised and broken and damaged. Anyone who lived his life the way he did, anyone who was into the things he was into sexually had some kind of damage.

I knew some of it – the stuff with his father, his brother, but I wanted more. I wanted to know all of him, everything.

He eyed me up and down and then I made the mistake of taking a step toward him.

He spun me around and held my hips. I felt his hard cock pressing against my legs, and he reached down and spread my thighs gently.

But he didn’t move into me.

“This is what you want?” he demanded roughly. “You want me inside you?”

“Yes,” I said, and I was breathless now. “I want you inside me.” I tried to turn around but he grabbed my hands and placed them up against the side of the shower, the tile slick and cold. He placed his hands over my spread palms and pushed against me, his rock hard cock pushing between my legs and over my pussy.

“Please,” I rocked back into him. I’d been hoping he would talk to me, had hoped he would open to me. We’d been through so much, and I was desperate to connect with him, but I knew this was all he could give me right now. So I would take it, and I would take it greedily.

His left hand gripped my throat while his right held my hip in place. He pulled me back toward him by the throat and kissed me again on the mouth. The movement caused his cock to push and slide against my opening.

“This is what you want?” he murmured against my lips.

“Yes.”

“To feel my cock spreading that tight little cunt?”

“Yes.”

He pushed the tip inside of me, spreading me, and I gasped as I always did when he first entered me. The water pounded around us, the spray misting our bodies as he held me tight.

I cried out as he pushed into me more.

“God, I love the sounds you make when I fuck you,” he murmured into my ear. He pulled me back tighter against him, his hand still on my throat. My tits thrust out, my nipples sticking out like two hard gumdrops. “Love those little whimpers of pain.”

His cock pushed further into my sensitive pussy. My clit throbbed with need so intense I felt it spreading through my entire body, all the way to my fingers and toes, which tingled with the sensation.

He leaned down and kissed my neck, then slid his tongue up to my ear, nipping at my lobe, his warm mouth pulling the sensitive flesh into his mouth.

I gasped again. “Please.”

“Please what?”

“Please fuck me.”

“You need to be fucked baby?” he rasped. “Nice and hard and fast?”

“Yes.”

He pulled his cock away and I whimpered, one of those little whimpers I knew he loved, and then before I knew it he’d plunged into me from behind, his whole cock stretching and filling my sex.

My core tightened and my clit thrummed, the pain and pleasure mixing together into an intoxicating cocktail. I threw my head back and Noah pulled my arms off the shower wall and pinned them behind me.

He held my wrists together, using them for leverage as he angled his hips and pumped into me.

With every thrust, the crest of his cock slid in and out of me, brushing against my clit.

“This is what you needed, baby? You needed to get fucked hard, didn’t you? Right in that tight little pussy?”

“Yes.”

“Yes, baby, look at those tits bouncing up and down while I fuck you.”

I groaned and he leaned down and licked my bottom lip before sucking it into his mouth so hard that when he let it go I felt swollen and bruised.

“Look,” he growled, and I did as he said, watching my breasts jiggle and move with every thrust.

He screwed me harder, angling his hips to get in deeper, my pussy so wet that he was sliding into me freely now. And yet with every push, I could feel myself spreading out around him, my pussy struggling to take every inch of him. I felt his balls against my ass.

“Noah,” I moaned.

I was going to come. My core clenched around him as my orgasm pulsed through me, spasms of pleasure ripping through me and shattering me into a million pieces.

“Charlotte.” He pulled out of me and pushed me down on the ground, pushing his cock into my mouth.

I sucked greedily, desperate for him to come. I watched him above me, his muscles clenching with the effort, the water beading off his skin, his body perfect and built.

I was wet again just watching him, and a moment later, he pulsed his seed into my mouth, spurt after spurt.

I swallowed it, mouthful after mouthful of cum, until he went still.

I stared up at him and he stared down at me.

I was on my knees, vulnerable for him.

And when he pulled me up and pressed my body to his, I closed my eyes and hoped that someday soon he would let himself be vulnerable for me.

* * *

He hadn’t come inside of me.

I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

And I hated that I didn’t want to bring it up to him, hated that I felt like things might just finally be getting back to normal with us and yet there were things I couldn’t say, couldn’t push him on. Noah Cutler was like a tricky puzzle or game of chess – every move you made when it came to him had to be calculated well in advance.

But I didn’t want to have to worry about being in the kind of relationship where every move had to be thought of, where I felt like I was always trying to get to checkmate. It had been long enough.

We were engaged, for God’s sake.

My new ring sparkled under the bathroom lights as I dried my hair, applied a swipe of lip gloss and a light smoky eye, then dressed in a pair of black pants and an oversized long cream-colored cashmere sweater that had mysteriously appeared in my closet.

“What time will you be done?” Noah asked when we were settled into the back of his black town car. There was a partition between us and the driver, and I reached over and pushed the button, driving up the barrier between us. I knew Jared wouldn’t be offended.

If Noah noticed that I wanted privacy, he didn’t remark on it. He was dressed in a black suit, his hair perfectly styled, his shoes shiny, his face freshly shaven. The collar of his crisp white shirt popped from under his suit coat, his cufflinks etched with the symbol of fancy Italian designer that was way too posh for me to ever have even heard of.

“It shouldn’t take long,” I said, smoothing my hair nervously. I wondered if I should have worn it up. Then I told myself I was being silly – I was just going down to get some information. This wasn’t anything official. I had no one to impress.

“That is very ambiguous language, Charlotte.”

“An hour? Maybe two? It depends on what they tell me when I get down there.” Now I was smoothing my pants, my palms suddenly sweaty.

“You’ll meet me at my office when you’re done.” It was a demand, not a question, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes at his bossiness. I could never be sure when such a gesture would result in him taking me over his knee, and that would definitely not get me to school.

“Yes, I’ll meet you,” I said. “but I’m going to go home and walk Docket first.”

I watched him out of the corner of my eye as his jaw twitched. I could tell he didn’t like it, me walking around the city without him.

“Call me before you take Docket out.”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve gotten information that leads me to believe that there’s going to be a story run today in the paper about us.”

My stomach flipped. My mother had come to visit not that long ago, and while she was here, she’d had an affair with a well-known tabloid reporter. I actually wasn’t sure you could even call it an affair. It was more like a one-night stand gone wrong.

“What will the article say?”

“I’m not sure,” Noah said. “But the press has gotten wind of what happened upstate, and they’re dying to print the details.”

Up until now, any coverage about what happened had to do with Professor Worthington being captured. Now, apparently, all the salacious details were going to be public.

His phone rang before I could press him for more details, and he reached into his pocket and pulled it out. Every gesture was fluid, everything about him elegant and yet somehow rugged at the same time.

My belly clenched, thinking about his hands on me, his mouth, the marks he left on my skin with the punishments he gave me. I shivered just thinking about it. He exuded sexuality, even just sitting here on the phone.

“Cutler,” he barked into the receiver. He frowned and checked his watch, the dark wide face of it somehow foreboding, like it was keeping time for things that couldn’t be mentioned. “I said 9 o’clock. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Have Maggie get us breakfast from Patisserie 9. Fine.” He clicked off without saying goodbye.

“Patisserie 9,” I said. “That’s fancy. Who are you having breakfast with?”

“Clementine.”

Her name caused my throat to clench.

“We’re going over the Lilah Parks case so that she can brief the new counsel.”

“Oh.” It was all I could think to say, even as jealousy streamed through my veins. Noah had recused himself from the Lilah Parks case of course – there was no way that he could continue to defend her after what had happened at Lameuix’s. But her trial would still take place – she’d murdered someone, even if new facts had come to light – so it made sense she would want a new lawyer.

I hated the idea of Clementine and Noah eating breakfast together, the two of them sipping coffee and laughing, their heads huddled together. I shifted on the seat.

“Is everything okay, Charlotte?” Noah asked as he reached over and picked up the New York Times from where it had been placed in the door’s side pocket. “You seem bothered.”

“I just don’t like the idea of you being alone with Clementine, that’s all.”

“Clementine is a colleague.”

“She’s your ex-girlfriend.”

“I didn’t have girlfriends before you.” His eyes scanned the paper, and I reached over and pushed it down and out of his reach. He looked up, raising his eyebrows in amusement at the gesture. But there was nothing amusing about how I felt.

“You know what I mean, Noah. You wouldn’t like it if there was a guy I was having breakfast with alone. You wouldn’t allow it.”

“You’re right,” he said. “I wouldn’t.”

“Why didn’t you come inside of me this morning?” I blurted.

Noah folded the paper and set it down on the seat across from him. “You know why.”

“See, there’s that lawyer talk,” I said, shaking my head. My fists balled in frustration and I tried not to get too upset. “You tell me I know why, but really, I have no idea.”

“Charlotte, you know how I feel about having a baby.”

“No,” I said. “Actually, I don’t. I know that you said you don’t want to get me pregnant. But I have no idea why or how you’re hoping I’ll respond to it.”

He got quiet and his phone buzzed again.

This time, he made no move to reach for it.

“Is having children something that’s important to you?” he asked.

“You’re asking me this now, when we’re five minutes away from dropping me off?”

“You said you wanted to talk.”

“No, I said I wanted to understand.” I shook my head. “And that takes more than just a one second conversation in the back of a car.”

He lowered his eyes, and I knew he felt vulnerable when it came to things like this, knew it was uncomfortable for him to talk about his feelings, his emotions, his past. But it was just as uncomfortable for me to do the things he required of me – the punishments, the rules, the possessive qualities he exhibited.

“If you decide this marriage is not something you’re interested in, I understand.”

“Jesus,” I said. “That’s what you got from this?” I reached over and touched his chin, turning his face toward mine. “I’m in this,” I said. “I want this. I want you. But having you means understanding things about you and talking about things.”

He went to look away again, to shut down the way he’d had countless times before. I would let him use my body if that’s what it took, I would make that trade off, but I was going to find out where this came from, what it was that kept him so closed off when it came to this. We were going to talk.

“You’re going to be my husband,” I said. “Now that this whole nightmare is behind us, we can start our life together. Our life as husband and wife.”

He pulled me close to him, his lips brushing against my temple. I inhaled his scent, the woodsy cologne and the faint musty scent of his shampoo.

“I want you,” he said. “Forever.”

“I want you too,” I said. “All of you.”

I closed my eyes as his hands wandered through my hair. But he didn’t say anything else, so finally I closed my eyes tighter and tried to make myself believe it was possible.

* * *

Noah kissed me goodbye and dropped me off in front of the administration building at Middleton. I’d been in the building a million times, but today its sweeping arches and broad columns seemed more foreboding than usual.

I took a deep breath.

There was nothing to be scared about, I told myself. I just needed to go in there and face whatever it was that was coming.

As I reached the top of the steps in front of the building, my phone rang, the caller ID showing a 212 number I didn’t recognize. I’d had enough of phone calls from numbers I didn’t recognize.

But I took a deep breath and answered it.

“Hello, can I speak with Charlotte Holloway please?” a perky young girl’s voice on the other end of the line chirped happily. In the background, I could hear the sounds of an office – typing, a phone ringing, the soft murmur of voices.

“Who’s calling please?” I asked.

“This is Clare from Dr. Solomon’s office,” she said. “Is this Charlotte? I’m just calling to confirm you appointment with Dr. Solomon tomorrow at 10 am.”

“This is Charlotte,” I said. “But I’m sorry, I don’t have an appointment with a Dr. Solomon.” I was at the doors to the building now and I opened them, moving out of the way as a kid in a three- piece suit carrying a briefcase almost bumped into me.

I swallowed my annoyance, and almost missed what the girl on the other end of the line was saying.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, sounding like she genuinely was. “I was sure that Mr. Cutler confirmed with the doctor, but maybe I was mistaken.”

“Wait, what?” I said. “Who made the appointment?”

“Noah Cutler,” she said. “He’s a friend of Dr. Solomon’s. He said you needed to be seen as soon as possible.”

“And what kind of doctor is Dr. Solomon?” I asked.

“She’s an OB-GYN,” the girl said.

“Got it,” I said. “Well, thanks, but I’ll have to call you back.”

“Okay. But –“

I hung up on her, not caring about whether or not I was being rude.

I text Noah immediately.

Dinner. Tonight. Seven o’clock.

This was getting ridiculous. We were going to talk, and we were going to do it tonight. Whether he liked it or not.

I have a meeting, came the reply.

Cancel it.

I watched the screen as three dots appeared, indicating he was typing a response. I imagined him sitting in the back of the car, frowning as he looked at his phone.

He probably thought I was being dramatic.

But Noah thought anything was dramatic when it came to actually talking about feelings, so it wasn’t like I could trust his judgment.

The three dots disappeared, and then started again, letting me know that he’d deleted something and then started again.

I liked that for once I was the one making him second-guess his responses.

Fine. We’ll order in.

No, I wrote back. We’re going out. I don’t care where. You pick.

There was no way I was going to have this conversation at our apartment, where he could do whatever he wanted to make sure I was distracted, to possess me, to dominate me, to own me.

At least out being out somewhere would temper that somewhat.

Fine. I will have my assistant make reservations.

I love you.

I love you too.

I blushed reading those words. Even though I was infuriated and frustrated, I loved him so much. I couldn’t imagine spending my life with anyone else. I just needed him to let me in.

I pushed open the door to the admissions office and waited patiently as the girl ahead of me fought with the work-study student who was working the desk. She was trying to get him to release her transcripts, but he kept insisting there was a ten-dollar fee, which she refused to pay.

She was really getting going, and by the time he’d told her to step aside, he looked rather frazzled.

“Just a minute,” he said to me. “I’m sorry, I’ll get someone else to help you. I need to take care of this.”

“No problem,” I said, trying to be kind since he looked like he was having a bad day.

But my magnanimous mood soured quickly when I saw who was stepping out of the back office to help me.

Josh.

Josh, who’d worked on Noah’s case with me, back when he’d been accused of murder.

Josh, who’d dated my old roommate Julia.

Josh, who I’d caught jerking off into my panties.

Josh, who was a total pervert and asshole and was supposed to have been called as one of the witnesses at my disciplinary hearing.

“Hi,” he said brightly, a smile lighting up his face like a smartass. “How can I help you today?”

“Um, I need information about how to withdraw from school,” I said, thrusting my chin into the air and daring him to give me shit.

He gave me an I-told-you-so smile, then reached under the desk and pulled out a packet of forms, slapping it down on the counter in front of me.

“There you go,” he said. “It has all the information you need about how to quit.”

I ignored the quip about quitting. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

I almost left then, because I really didn’t feel like dealing with this. But I came here to figure out what was going on with my disciplinary hearing. And it wasn’t like Josh didn’t know about it. I’d seen his name on the list of witnesses that had been sent to my apartment.

“I’d also like to check the status of my disciplinary hearing,” I said. I forced myself to sound businesslike. “I was told the case had been closed.”

He looked at me. “Oh, really? That’s too bad. I was really hoping that I’d have a chance to see you there.”

I stayed quiet, giving him a death glare, until he sighed and typed something into the computer.

“Yes,” he said. “It looks like whoever made the claim dropped it.”

“Thanks,” I said automatically before I could stop myself. He didn’t deserve any kind of politeness, but I didn’t have to worry, because it didn’t seem like he was even paying attention to me. Instead, he was reading the complaint against me.

I could see the form up on the screen, typed out neatly, the boxes filled with all kinds of information and what looked like a lengthy statement whoever had made the complaint had given. I couldn’t believe he was reading it in front of me so blatantly. It had to be against some kind of confidentiality rules.

“Can I get a copy of that?” I asked.

Josh shrugged. “I guess.”

He hit print and a machine whirled to life in the background. “Good idea to have it for your new school,” he said. “They’re going to want to know what you got up to.”

“Thanks,” I said, sarcastically this time. “I really appreciate your concern.”

He took his time handing it over, his eyes scanning the page. “All for some guy,” he said, sighing and shaking his head.

I went to grab the paper out of his hand, but he held it out of my reach. “We charge fifteen dollars for copies.”

“I thought it was ten,” I said, remembering what had just been said to the girl before me.

“New policy.”

“In the last five minutes?”

He shrugged, like he was just a cog in a machine who could do nothing about it, instead of an asshole trying to rip me off.

I forked over the money, wanting to get out of there, and figuring it would be better to give him an extra five dollars instead of prolonging our interaction.

He shoved the money in his pocket.

I grabbed the paper and got out of there as fast as I could.

I sat down on a bench by the front doors, my eyes scanning over the complaint. Phrases like “inappropriate relationship with Mr. Cutler” and “compromising her integrity and ability to do her job” jumped out at me, but there was nothing really there that I wasn’t expecting.

Under status, it said “COMPLAINT DROPPED” but I knew this would be part of my permanent file, something I’d have to explain no matter where else I got into school. But hopefully if I could prove that Lameuix had been the one behind it, I could explain why the complaint had been filed, and that malicious intent behind it.

My eyes drifted down to the part where the person who’d made the complaint had needed to sign it.

I expected to see Lameuix’s real name – Domino Bentley.

But when I saw whose signature filled the line, my breath caught in my chest.

But why would --

And then it all fell into place.

I got up and ran outside.

I needed to get to Noah before it was too late…