Ruin & Rule

I already have that problem. However, I’d woken up in hell with no reflex fear of the devil.

“Why did you bring me here?” Why me and none of the other girls?

He sighed heavily, pinching the brow of his nose. The tips of his fingers left another streak of blood across his face. It glistened in the bright lights of the garage. “Don’t make me repeat myself.” With a fast move, he reached behind and pulled a gun free from his waistband.

I knew it was there. I’d seen it glinting like black death while he bent over the gas tank of his bike and drove us here. Every mile we’d traveled, I’d toyed with the idea of grabbing it and holding it to his temple.

But every scenario of threatening a man who was the only link between keeping me from being roadkill ended badly. I preferred being alive to spread on the road. And I definitely preferred the element of surprise.

Act docile. Then he would never expect the mayhem building inside me.

I squared my shoulders. “You won’t shoot me.”

“Why not?”

Because you do know me. No matter how vehemently you deny it.

“Because you said it yourself—I’m to be sold. What happens to you when the buyer doesn’t get what he paid for?”

It was a gamble, but I decided to use shock value to get a reaction from him. I wanted to scream that there was something between us. To force him to acknowledge it, but at the same time, I had no proof. I needed to see evidence from him, before I fully believed it myself.

He cocked his head. “You’re seriously gonna make me believe you care about what happens when a trafficker doesn’t deliver skin to his buyer?”

I swallowed. “No. But I do care about getting answers. Answers I’m willing to risk my life to gain.”

He grinned, motioning with the gun for me to head toward the door leading presumably into the house. “You think I’ll answer your questions?”

I nodded, padding toward the door and pulling it open. A waft of air-conditioning greeted me. “You will because you’ll owe me.”

My eyes fell to the spreading bloodstain on his chest. His deterioration had been gradual but not unnoticed. I could sense his wooziness, the lack of strength ebbing like a tide. I couldn’t explain it—yet another hint at who I’d been before this nightmare.

He laughed softly. “I’ll owe you?”

Turning in the doorway, I pointed at the soppiness of his shirt dripping from beneath his brown leather jacket. “You’re bleeding profusely. If you don’t stop moving and lie down, you’ll pass out.” Lowering my voice, I added, “I can help you.”

He stalked forward. “Do I look like I’m fucking weak?”

I gritted my teeth, battling against the flush of fear with him storming so close. He brought the reek of blood and metal and the power of a pissed-off male. His jaw was strong and square, his nose neither too big nor too long. Everything about him was symmetrically in proportion, making him the handsomest criminal I’d ever met.

You think you’ve ever met.

My brain hurt.

“All I know is you’re hurt, and if you don’t sit down soon, you’ll pass out and I’ll just leave you there and escape.”

To where?

You’re mostly naked with no identity, no money—how far could you run with nothing?

But none of that mattered because there was one thing keeping me alive. One thing driving me forward, giving me strength, making me fight and not give into the horror of my situation.

Answers.

I needed them more than I needed air. I needed truth more than I needed safety, freedom, or rescuing.

Answers were my driving force because I currently lived in a worse prison than any Arthur Killian could trap me in.

I was nothing. Nobody. Lost. Alone. Orphaned from all thoughts.

Answers were the key and this man had them.

“Escape!” he snorted. “Fuck, the cops won’t save you. They’re worse than us.”

The police will help. You’ve done nothing wrong.

I would flee if there wasn’t some horrible niggle poking my brain every time I thought of screaming for help and running. There was no doubt in my mind I could run fast enough to make my capturer chase me, cause his heart to pump harder, and for him to pass out. His eyes were hazy and pain-filled already. It wouldn’t take much to make him topple.

Then why didn’t I do it?

Because the thought of entering a world where I have no idea where I belong scares the bejesus out of me.

Baby steps. My world had shrunk to this man, his house, and fixing an injury I had the skills—hopefully—to heal. Everything else… It held no allure. A kindly spoken police officer couldn’t help me. A shrink couldn’t help me.

But this man could.

Kill waved his gun. “Stop talking and get in the house.”

I didn’t back down. I didn’t flinch from his anger or smug power.

When I didn’t move, he muttered, “The police are just as corrupt as us. The minute they caught you, you’d be living an entirely different nightmare.”

Shoving the gun back into his waistband, he suddenly shoved me forward into his house. “You’re like a one-woman comedy show. Just shut up and do as you’re told.”

I didn’t retaliate. Instead, I let him push me down the corridor that spilled us out into a rotund two-story entrance hall. The architecture of curved wall, domed glass roof, and wooden circular stairs would’ve been spectacular if it wasn’t for the dangerous man hissing in pain behind me.