FOR ALL MY out of character rage and holding Suzette hostage, I struggled to harness fake bravery the moment the standoff was over.

My voice and confidence were still so new that using them drained me to the point of utter exhaustion. Being so inexperienced at barking commands and not cowering under retorts meant I sat opposite Tess with my heart impersonating a cheetah, beating as fast as it could, hoping against hope that she didn’t see how everything I did was an act—a role I desperately wanted to play but had yet to learn the script.

Tess’s head cocked, her gaze sharp and unforgiving. Nerves catapulted down my spine as she sniffed, perhaps seeing more than I wanted her to or correctly assuming things I couldn’t hide.

Anxious shakes found me.

Nervous flutters filled me.

A suddenly dry throat stole the rest of my debate.

Tearing my eyes from her, I glanced around the library where we sat.

She’d changed her mind against escorting me into the lounge the moment I’d nodded and went to follow. She’d glanced at the general untidiness of the living room and quickly strode across the foyer into the oppressive but impressive library.

Red leather-bound editions, midnight blue novels, and more recent colourful paperbacks slept on shelves towering around us. It might’ve been a shadowing, looming place if the artfully placed lamps didn’t turn it into a full room embrace.

Interspersed with ancient, expensive classics sprawled the bright garish illustrations of children books.

I inhaled sharply as yet more baby stuff appeared now I’d noticed.

A tiny bib sat on a closed laptop on the desk by the window. A rattle lay forgotten on the sheepskin rug by the fireplace. A pacifier lolled on a blue blanket on the arm of the chair Tess sat in.

The anxiety in my stomach hardened into yet another reminder that my life would never have such things cluttering it. If I ever had a library as nice as this, it wouldn’t be decorated with baby paraphernalia.

Tess caught me staring at the pacifier. Picking it up, she placed it smoothly into her jeans pocket as if she didn’t want me looking. “So…” Clearing her throat, she relaxed into her chair, the back soaring up like wings behind her. “Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? What’s your name?”

For someone who’d grown used to talking to strangers and friends—for someone who’d been held in police captivity and had no choice but to say her true name—I still wasn’t comfortable handing out such personal information.

It wasn’t right.

Society had taught us a name was the first thing given to a stranger. That it was unimportant.

Can’t people see it’s the total opposite?

A name was the most personal thing anyone could give. It was their title, their identity, the one word that could summon or dismiss them.

Tasmin was alive and breathing inside me now. I could no longer deny her existence or the knowledge that one day…I would claim that name for myself.

But if I wasn’t ready, if I wasn’t worthy…what made anyone else so?

Letting heavy silence scatter into the carpet by our feet, Tess didn’t ask again or prompt me to reply. She didn’t seem to mind the tautness existing between us, and I’d lived with such angst-ridden silence for too long to cower beneath it.

Our eyes locked.

Blue to green.

And something strange happened.

I recognised her.

Not from a magazine article like I’d recognised Nila Weaver but a soul-deep recognition.

A nudge inside that said…you share something with this woman. You have more in common than you think.

Needing validation on such a wild theory, I murmured, “Before I tell you who I am…can you tell me who you are?”

The steel in my tone softened to a more malleable fabric. Something that wouldn’t break but wouldn’t stay in one unyielding entity either.

Tess dropped her gaze to my ballgown, licking her bottom lip. The dynamics between her everyday casual wear and my fancy evening garb didn’t go unnoticed. We were opposites even if something linked us that we couldn’t explain.

Ghosts shadowed her gaze, followed by a quick smirk. “All right.”

When she didn’t start straight away, I held my breath, wondering if she’d changed her mind.

But then she said softly, “For some reason, I don’t think you’re asking who I am now…more so…who I was before. Am I right?”

I didn’t fully understand but nodded. “Why do I get the feeling you know what I’ve lived through?”

She smiled gently. “Because my husband has been saving slaves all his life and I’ve embraced his calling as my own. We’ve both seen things that severely lowers our opinion of the human race—”

I shook my head. “It’s more than that.”

She paused, studying me. “You’re right.”

We stared, doing our best to read the other. Her body language gave nothing away, revealing nothing more than a woman who was used to wealth and love and confident in her position in life. But then something damaged flickered in her gaze as if she permitted the past to shadow for a split second.

That was the part of her I recognised.

A question stained my tongue, begging to be asked, but wasn’t something anyone could slip into normal conversation.

Were you sold too?

I lowered my gaze, stroking the bruised pretty colours of my gown. My penny bracelet glittered against the maroon and midnight, bright in its affection. Elder’s kindness and love existed in every diamond-coin.

Elder…please be alive.

“I’ve never done this before, but I’m going to ignore my usual speech on how I’m the mistress of this house and forgo the necessary introduction about where you can go, what you can expect, and other housekeeping requirements.”

My eyes shot up.

“You already know I’m married to a man I hold in the highest regard and obey with utmost loyalty. I say obey, not because of archaic marriage vows, but because he is my master. My chosen master.”

I gasped.

The language she chose hinted at her past. Phrases such as master and obey I knew well. For the first time since leaving Alrik’s, I found some resemblance of familiarity even if it was twisted and wrong to find comfort in such things.

Living with Elder, the emphasis had been on freedom and personal choice.

Here, with Tess, she spoke of love in rules and affection in laws. It upset me to almost miss those boundaries—to know how big my world was and the consequences of trying to stretch those borders. Those guidelines were more acceptable than being told I could do anything and be anyone with no repercussions.

Sometimes (and I would never tell Elder this) but sometimes, the world he offered and choices he gave and experiences he presented were too big, too much, too soon.

Tess gave me something I hadn’t known I needed to hear—that it was okay to love the way you wanted to love.

She sat forward, pinning me with her intense stare. “Q is my master, but that doesn’t mean I obey him in all things. In fact, I’d say I hold all the power because I know how much he loves me.” She smiled ruthlessly. “Knowing I could break him is why I can give him every part of myself. And that is what was missing in your relationship with the man who owned you. He might’ve told you he loved you. You might’ve believed you loved him. But believe me when I say that wasn’t true.”

I didn’t know how to reply.

She had it all wrong. I understood the power she mentioned because I’d felt it when Elder confessed he loved me. The brittle desperation in his touch as he held me. The clawing hunger as he entered me. He’d given me everything, and I’d taken it without thought.

The same had happened to me.

And there was nothing fake or wrong about our connection.

If he was dead…then that would be the moment I truly broke. Not from rape or punishment but from trading hearts with him then destined to live heartless and empty without him.

The leather of Tess’s chair creaked as she said, “Before I was Tess Mercer, I was Tess Snow—unwanted by her elderly parents, throwing herself on a boy who could never fulfil her, and begging for answers about who she truly was. Then…I was kidnapped.”

I sucked in a breath as yet another déjà vu moment knocked on my mind. Somehow, even though our beginning stories were different, we were so similar.

I’d found a kindred ally in this girl.

Pity she still believed I was delusional when she could potentially be a friend. If only she listened instead of being so blind, I could find another avenue of healing.

“I was kidnapped in Mexico.” Her voice turned harsh with hate. “I was branded, repurposed, and sold.”

Tears warmed my eyes, knowing she’d suffered the same fate.

She knew what it was like to be washed and dressed by men who only cared about your health because it dictated how much they could get for your body.

It didn’t matter frustration steadily grew at her incorrect assumptions about Elder and me; I grieved for her just like I grieved for me. “I’m so sorry.”

Tess didn’t acknowledge my commiseration. Instead, she sat taller with a pride glinting in her gaze. “I was sold, and for a few months I was tormented by the man who took me.”

I shook my head. I didn’t want to hear anymore. To listen to the mirror image of my tale of rapes and silent screams. Of starvation and broken bones. “You don’t have to say anymore. I understand.”

I dared glance up.

Her gaze softened to melted butter with a knife of pain—not for herself but for me. “You do understand, and that makes me so sad. That’s why it kills me to hear you say you love the bastard who did such things to you.” Tess slouched. “How long were you…”

I was glad she didn’t finish that sentence. That she didn’t ask how long I’d put up with having someone dominate and control my every twitch and thought. “Two years. But the man who kept me isn’t the man I’m in love—”

“Yet you manhandled Suzette with a spirit that isn’t broken.” She laughed under her breath, disregarding my need to clarify. “I’m glad Q didn’t find you before he met me…who knows what might’ve happened.”

I frowned, side-tracked. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I was like you. I didn’t let them break me.” She shook her head, snorting depreciatively. “However, unlike you, I wasn’t in slavery for two years. I’m the one who must say sorry. You’re far stronger than I am, even if you do believe you’re in love—”

“You keep misunderstanding me. I am in love with Elder, and he’s in love with me, but he’s not the man who bought me.”

She pursed her lips. “He really did a number on you, didn’t he? Just because he might’ve changed and grown to treat you fondly throughout your imprisonment, doesn’t mean he isn’t still the same man who bought you for pleasure.”

Ugh, I can’t handle this woman.

Crossing my arms, I fought the urge to cuff her around the head and demand she actually listen instead of regurgitating pamphlet information on a rescued slave’s mental health.

“You don’t understand what I’m saying.”

Instead of matching my frustration with her own, she gave me a sympathetic smile. “Look, I’ll be the first to admit I enjoyed some parts of those few months. The circumstances my master put me in…well, some were wanted while others were not.”

“Excuse me?” What sort of hypocrisy had I been dragged into? “So you can say you actually enjoyed being tortured, yet I can’t say I’m in love with the man who—”

Tess reached out and took my balled hands. “I’m sorry. Forgive me. That was super insensitive. I’m only trying to show you how nothing you tell me will be judged. I understand if you’re in love with him. I get that. Truly, I do. I also understand two years is a very long time, and you’re bound to have found some slivers of acceptability—enough so that your mind might warp what was normal behaviour and what wasn’t.”

She squeezed my fingers. “You’re not alone. Not by a long shot. That’s all I’m trying to say.”

“I know I’m not alone because Elder made sure I wasn’t. He was the first to show me how love should be.”

She nodded quickly, accepting what I said but still believing Elder was Alrik and not two separate people. How much longer would I have to repeat myself? Elder didn’t deserve to be thought of as a rapist. He wasn’t. He was my guardian angel. My genie. My best-friend.

Tess sighed heavily, almost as if she didn’t want to admit something. “Look, there’s something about you I find familiar, and I think it’s because I see myself in you. Because of that, I need you to hear me when I say I’m here for you—we all are. But returning to your normal life—going back to family and friends—will be so much harder if you keep believing you’re in love with your past owner. I understand because I was sold to a man most would call a monster. I stood up to him like you stood up to me today. I told him I would never call him master. I spat at him. Ran away from him. Never, ever bowed to him.”

My heart hammered for the beatings she must’ve received. The horror she must’ve endured. “How-how are you still alive? How did you escape?”

“I didn’t.”

Were all conversations with this woman going to be a riddle? “Who saved you then?”

She must’ve had a man like Elder. Someone who loved her so much they tracked her down and gave her a new life.

“He did.”

“Who?”

“My husband.”

“Ah.” I nodded as if I understood completely when I had no clue at all. But then I remembered who her husband was and what he’d dedicated his life to: hunting slaves and saving them. A vigilante with no moral compass. “Q saved you from your old master?”

So she does understand.

Our tales copied each other.

“Not in so many ways.”

My brain hurt. “In what ways, then?”

“He saved me from himself. He saved me from myself.” She sighed, finally revealing her sordid secret. “Q was the man I was sold to. He literally is my master first and husband second.”

My thoughts screeched to a halt. “What?”

She had the nerve to school me on my incorrect love choices, yet she’d fallen for the man she was sold to! At least, I’d fallen for the man who’d saved me from such a fate. She looked at me as if I was tangled and twisted when the only person who needed help was her!

“So you see, I totally get it when you say you’ve fallen for your master.” Tess rushed, noticing my gobsmacked look. “I did the same thing. Only, after those first few months, Q never laid a hand on me that I didn’t want.”

Her gaze dropped to my chest where fading bruises might always remain and to my arms where bumps from broken bones ruined slim line limbs. “I see how badly you were hurt, and I honestly want to slaughter the man who did that to you. To hear you say you love him? To have you sit here, safe and far away from him, and still do everything you can to return to his abuse? It’s more than I can stand. I can condone falling in love because I committed the same sin, but what I can’t condone is allowing you to believe the way he treated you is normal. It’s not. No matter what he tells you.”

The house switched from welcoming to mausoleum.

Scenarios and theories span out of control. Maybe I had it all wrong. Maybe I wasn’t the recovering slave with issues but she was. Perhaps, she was held here against her will and conditioned so completely, she not only bowed to her master’s wishes but went along with his crazy ideas about saving women, only to secretly condemn them instead?

What if this was an elaborate sham to lull women into thinking they were saved only to start the same cycle of mental and physical abuse all over again?

All of this was some disgusting mind game.

A trap.

I have to leave.

Right now.

I shot upright, fear twining through my limbs. “Let me go. I want to go. Please, please let me go.”

Tess stood too, eyeing my gown. “Where would you go dressed like that?”

“Back to him. Back to the man who saved me.”

“I just told you. What you feel for him isn’t love, no matter how he spun it.” Her eyes flashed. “Q saved you. My husband saved you. You’re safe here. With us.”

“No, I’m not. You’re sick. You tell me I’m wrong for falling in love with my rescuer, yet you fell in love with your owner. Which one of us is wrong in this scenario?”

I’d been wrong when I thought she could be a friend—someone who traded the same existence I had. The woman before me had become corrupted by whatever her owner had done long ago. And she still believed in his lies.

Dragging hands through my hair, I threw my own tale in the face of the strange one she’d told me. “I’ve listened to you. Now, you listen to me. You have it all wrong. Like you, I was kidnapped and sold. Like you, I fought against my master and managed to keep a part of myself from his evil. I lived with him for two years, and they were the worst two years of my life. I have mementoes from that time. I have scars and nightmares. But that was over. Your husband didn’t save me. He didn’t infiltrate that white devil mansion or take on the bastard who raped me. He didn’t help me shoot Alrik or carry me from that place with my tongue almost cut in two. He didn’t spend months making me come alive again, teaching me kindness instead of cruelty and love instead of hate. Your husband didn’t kill for me. He didn’t sail away with me. He didn’t fall in love with me.”

My dress whispered on the carpet, cascading over the rattle on the sheepskin rug as I stalked toward her. “Your husband did none of those things, but I’ll tell you who did. Elder Prest. The man I keep telling you about. The man you believe is my owner. Pay attention when I tell you Elder was not my owner. He was my saviour, and you stole him from me!”

I shook with the need for her to understand, to see, to believe, to finally get how stupid she’d been. “Elder was that man. He did those things. He rescued me months ago and has been bringing me back to life ever since. You say I’m not broken. That I’m like you. But I’m not. I’m nothing like you. I was broken. I was all kinds of broken. Before Elder, all I wanted to do was die. I was days away from making that wish come true, so don’t say I’m like you. Don’t say they didn’t break me because they did. And only Elder had the power to bring me back.”

I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t prevent my snarl and snap. “You and your husband ruined the only good thing in my life. You stole me from the man who gave my life back. You destroyed everything. Don’t you see? Your husband shot him. He. Shot. Him. And I don’t know if he’s alive or dead or even where he is because you keep treating me as if I’m a child who doesn’t know her own thoughts.”

Tears trickled down my face, unable to stay bottled up.

The fissure of missing Elder echoed like an arctic gale. It hurt more than anything, and I wanted to pass that pain onto Tess who glowed with adoration whenever she mentioned the hated man named Q.

She could never be my friend because she’d married my nemesis.

“I’m done with this, with you, with that bastard you call your master. I’m done, do you hear me!” Stalking to the library double doors, I clutched my skirts and bowled through them tossing a livid growl over my shoulder. “Now you know the truth, I’m leaving. You can’t stop me. Don’t you dare try to stop me.” My voice wobbled but from anger instead of tears. “I’ll kill you if you do.”

Tess darted from the library as I beelined for the front door. “Wait—”

“Don’t!” I fumbled with the lock. “Just don’t. If you truly are in the business of saving slaves, then stay back and let me go.”

The lock sprung open; I wrenched the door wide. Dusk had fallen, casting everything in a sleepy haze.

I ran.

Tess didn’t try to grab me or shout, but she did chase after me, flying down the sweeping grand entrance, her feet bare like mine, equal slaps on marble.

I daren’t turn around or yell at her to stay away. I was out of breath, heart wild, mind manic; all I wanted to do was run. I didn’t care where at this point only that I had to get away from her.

Immediately.

A water fountain splashed merrily in the middle of the driveway, roosting birds filled the sky with chirps and twitters.

I hated the beauty of this place because it had come from the happiness of others.

“Wait, please!” Tess called, running after me but not trying to overtake. If her goal was to outrun me until I faltered, then she’d be running for a while.

I had enough adrenaline to power ten marathons.

Dashing past the fountain, I winced as asphalt switched to gravel. Hop-running, I darted for the grass verge just as a black car rounded the corner and coasted to a stop in front of me.

No!

Footsteps crunched behind me as the car’s back door opened and out stepped Q Mercer—my enemy.

His black suit matched his black aura, his jade eyes aloof and unreadable. I hated that he was handsome. I hated that he had the woman he loved. I hated everything he’d done to me.

But most of all, I hated what he held tucked close to his chest, protecting it with his body.

It wasn’t a gun or syringe in which to destroy my life.

It was something I wanted more than anything, and something I would never have.

A fat, squirmy baby in a green two-piece.

The strange image of a monster holding an infant slammed me into a brick wall, but it didn’t stop Tess running behind me.

Air rustled as she charged past, ran directly up to her husband, and instead of kissing him hello, or telling him to subdue me, or even reaching for the baby cooing happily at her arrival, she braced her legs, raised her hand, and slapped her damn husband on the cheek.