Prologue
M y heart hammering, I lay whisper still.
His breathing had evened out an hour ago, but I wanted to make sure. I needed to make sure. Shirtless, his jeans still on, he’d come to bed late after spending hours in the kitchen with two men I didn’t know.
I never knew them.
He purposely kept it that way. Everyone in his life had their place and he liked layers of separation between all of us, because he was cunning. I just didn’t know how cunning until it was too late.
A deep breath rattled through his chest as he exhaled and rolled toward me.
I quickly moved to the edge of the bed.
His arm reached out because even in his sleep he kept tabs on me.
Holding my breath, my heart threatening to stop, I took the pillow out from under my head and fitted it under his arm.
He immediately pulled the pillow to his chest and settled back in.
I let out the breath I’d been holding as I watched him. His blond hair messy, his features softened by sleep, his bare chest cut with lean muscles, he slept like an angel. There was no denying he was a beautiful man.
But he was ruthless.
I silently counted out five minutes, then slow, millimeter by millimeter, my heartbeat pounding in my ears, I slid off my side of the bed. When my knees touched the floor, I pulled my last arm free and reached under the bed for my backpack.
The nylon material slid easily across the carpet, and as the last strap cleared the cheap metal frame holding the mattress, I silently stood.
One step, two, I backed up.
He slept .
Three steps.
His chest rose with an inhale.
Four.
He exhaled, and I turned for the door.
My hand sweaty, I grabbed the old doorknob and turned it. Feeling the tension in the spring inside, I held firm and slowly pulled. Hinges I’d oiled earlier in the week with cooking oil silently did their job, and the door opened without a whisper.
Moving my foot to the right, just inside the doorframe for balance, I stepped clear over the squeak in the floor. My other foot followed and I was in the living room. Letting out a small breath, I moved silently across the floor to the slider to the porch.
Then my heart stopped.
The glass door I’d purposely left ajar was not only shut, it was locked.
The lock would click, and the slider would whoosh if I opened it now. In a panic I glanced at the front door. It’d been warped since before we’d signed the lease three months ago. It stuck every time we opened it. We’d laughed about it when we’d moved in, joking we’d hear a burglar from a mile away.
Now the joke was on me.
I looked at the two windows in the living room that faced the front of the building, but it was a two-story drop to the front walkway.
I looked back at the slider.
I didn’t have a choice.
Determination sinking into my frayed nerves, I shouldered my backpack. Holding my free hand over the lock in an attempt to muffle the sound when it unlatched, I pushed the lever down as slow as possible.
A click sounded, and I froze.
One second, two… ten. I counted to thirty but no movement came from the bedroom.
My heart in my throat, I peered out at the dark porch and rickety steps that led down to the inky blackness of the overgrown backyard. The moonlight cast sporadic shadows as it tried to filter through the tall scrub pines lining the property.
Saying a silent prayer, I pulled the slider open.
A whooshing, suction sound echoed like it was a thousand decibels, and I flinched as I slid the door open a heart-stopping inch. Then two… five… seven… a few more inches and I could squeeze through sideways.
Almost… almost there.
My hands shaking, my pulse pounding, I hit my invisible mark and turned to squeeze out.
“Going somewhere?”
Shrieking, I jumped and my backpack thumped against the glass. One arm, one leg, and half my body out the door, I lurched, but I wasn’t quick enough.
He grabbed the straps of my backpack and hauled me back inside. His face contorted with anger, he yanked me in front of him. “I asked you a question.” Cool, distant, his tone belied the lethal expression on his face.
“I….” I didn’t have a response. I was caught. He knew it. I knew it.
“You what?” he demanded, his biceps flexing as he held me by my backpack straps. “You were just going to leave without saying goodbye?” The anger in his features dangerously morphed into a calm I feared more than anything. “Who got to you?” he asked quietly.
Oh God . “No one.”
“Who is it?” he demanded.
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Who’s telling you to leave?” Paranoid, always paranoid, he glanced out the window. “Who’s waiting for you?”
“No one. You know there’s no one else.” There never had been.
His insane stare fixed on me, he switched gears. “I’m not good enough for you?”
“I never said—”
Interrupting, he didn’t give me a chance to respond. “You think you can run away from who we are? ”
“I’m not try—”
“You were working two jobs to pay your old man’s bills when I found you.” He leaned close and the smell of mint and cigarettes drifted over me. “I saved you from that.”
Misplaced guilt consumed me. “I’m sorry.”
“This is how you repay me? By walking out?”
“Please,” I begged. “You know what I want.” I’d asked him repeatedly. There was no reason for me to stay anymore. We both knew that.
“No,” he stated firmly, as if we’d never talked about this. “I really don’t.”
“I can’t do this,” I whispered.
“Can’t do what?”
It was now or never. I’d made the decision. I was halfway there. I wasn’t going to back out now. I just wasn’t.
“I can’t be with you anymore,” I dared to say.
He didn’t blink. His expression didn’t change. Not one muscle in his face moved… but he let go of my backpack straps.
I exhaled the breath I was holding, confident in the fact that he’d never laid hands on me. “Thank y—”
Quicker and faster than a flash of lighting, he palmed the switchblade he always kept in his front pocket and released the knife. Grabbing my left hand, he threw my arm against the slider doorframe and held it.
“You can’t be with me ?” he quietly seethed.
Fear exploded like a grenade. “Stop!”
With two swift, cruel slashes of the tip of his knife, he carved into the flesh of my inside wrist.
Bright red welts appeared a split second before the pain.
Holding my arm, leaning into me, he got in my face. “You think you can’t be with me ?” Insanity twisted his features. “I own you.” His fingers tightened, crushing my hand as blood dripped down my arm. “ I own you .”