Chapter 18
18
LUCA
C elia took my hand. Of course she did—she was a cool, calculating girl at her best. Her gaze roamed my face, cataloguing the neat stitches that had closed up the wound across my forehead and scalp.
I touched the wound. “You gave me a great alibi for why I disappeared. While you were in time-out, I went back to your father and convinced him that I was knocked unconscious in the fight to keep you from being kidnapped. Lucky me. Briggs and DeGeorge were killed trying to protect your honor.”
“What about the security cameras?” I asked.
“The cameras in the garage didn’t survive the fighting.”
“How long have you been plotting whatever it is you’re planning?” she asked me as she moved past me, straining toward the sunlight. Her bare feet left tracks in the dust.
“My plans are so boring, Celia. I want to talk about your plans.” My voice turned to ice. “For instance, what did you plan to do with that vase I found you cradling like your teddy bear?”
Her chin lifted defiantly.
I tsked at her, taking her elbow to make sure she didn’t break away from me as we stepped out into the dew-soaked grass. “I admire your spirit, but I am going to have to break you of your inclination to murder me.”
She cut her eyes at me. There was anger and fear there, too, and her face was a wreck of dried tears and smeared makeup. The fear was enough to keep her quiet.
I touched the corner of her eye, running my thumb through the dried smear of white saltiness left behind. I despised the sight of anyone crying. “You’re an ugly crier.”
Her lips pressed together tightly.
“But I am fascinated by how you can cry and be violent at the same time,” I admitted.
I’d despised her tears. And because I had dismissed her as emotional, I hadn’t seen what was coming the second before she bashed me across the head.
She was just watching me. She didn’t say anything, though her throat bobbed as she swallowed hard. She was scared, and she was trying to figure out just what to say or do to handle me.
I had the upper hand in every way. She was trapped in my cemetery. She was naked, exhausted, and terrified.
So why did I feel undone by my own desire? Out of control? Last night, I’d wanted to bend her over the tombstones and fuck all her rebellion away. I wanted to own her body and her mind, and I wanted her to submit to me.
Willingly.
I wasn’t sure what special kind of fucked up I must be, but I liked her even more after she hit me with the shovel. Clearly, all the assholes in her life hadn’t broken her.
But Celia, who had responded to me despite her fear, both when I first dragged her to her father’s study and then in the graveyard, still needed something. The key to breaking her wasn’t fear.
I had a feeling I could own her if I showed her some tenderness.
As hard as it would be to keep from ripping off her clothes and punishing that lush body…I was always happy to play mind games with my starlight.
One way or another, I would own her.
CELIA
His grip on me was firm even once he got me through the front door. I noticed the front porch was clean of anything sharp or more dangerous than a throw pillow, and when I got inside, the house was quiet.
The foyer was long, spanning the length of the house—which was considerable—and sun-drenched. I could see the enormous family room at the far end, and caught a glimpse of a stone fireplace, surrounded by bookshelves, and a cozy-looking sectional.
“Come eat.” His hand settled on my lower back as he led me with him to the enormous eat-in kitchen.
My breath caught in my chest. The enormous white granite countertop contained threads of gold and gray, matched with gold hardware. The cabinets themselves were a deep shade of green, just like the ones I had once colored in my journal—though I hadn’t had quite the right shade of colored pencil. This was the right shade. I’d never been here before, but the room felt familiar, as if it had been spun out of my fantasies.
I glanced at him suspiciously, wondering if he had somehow gotten his hands on my diaries, even though I had burned them long ago. But he seemed oblivious to my reaction.
The kitchen wasn’t just like the one I had once sketched. There was an enormous espresso machine. The layout was different. A wicker bowl on the island held piles of glistening apples, oranges, and bananas, and my stomach rumbled. It had been a long time since I last ate.
His brows knit together, and I wondered if he was faking his evident displeasure at my hunger.
“Since you left me locked up last night,” I began.
“Where I knew you were safe,” he chided me, as if it were an act of care.
“There were spiders,” I told him.
He scoffed. “If you want your life to be pleasant, Celia, you’ll have to learn to make your life pleasant.”
“What does that mean?”
“You should obey me.”
I let out a laugh—a hard, bitter one. He was steering me toward the table, which looked out over the forest beyond. It was already spread with a luscious breakfast.
“I obeyed my father and Royal. I didn’t find myself particularly happy.”
“No, you didn’t.” He sounded so confident that my stomach dropped.
I made myself keep moving, even though I was struck with a sudden sense of horror. Were Moriah and Kara in danger? But I was facing away from him, so he didn’t see my face. I caught the briefest glimpse of my reflection in the window and the horror written across my face—god, I really did look like a mess with destroyed makeup—and then I made sure my face was a mask as I turned to him.
“But a woman should choose wisely when it comes to what kind of man she submits to.” His voice was silky as he drew my chair out for me.
“And what kind of choice should she make?” I asked archly, taking the chair and letting him push it in for me.
The kind of man who will grant her anything she wishes, so that the submission is just a game. The kind of man where she’s really the one who rules, where her submission is a tool of her pleasure.
I’d never even seen that kind of relationship in the real world, but I grew up in such a terrible version of the world. I wanted to believe the kinds of romances I read about in books could be real.
“A man who is worthy.” His touch skimmed over my bare shoulder as he stood over my chair.
I yanked away from him, and he laughed. I caught a glimpse of the two of us reflected now by the window. He was tall and perfectly handsome, dressed immaculately in a suit that clung to his powerful, muscular body. Meanwhile, I sat in front of him, exposed in nothing but my bra and underwear, streaked with mud and grass stains and even blood.
His blood, though I couldn’t manage much satisfaction in that fact at the moment.
Without missing a beat, he took a seat, so close that our knees brushed briefly as he settled in.
“I want to watch you eat.”
I scoffed. He raised one eyebrow at me—god, he did that so exquisitely—and I jerked my gaze away from the perfect planes of his face.
“Why is that funny?” he asked, holding up a tray of pastries and offering it to me.
I licked my lips, stalling for time. They were dry after my unpleasant evening. Would it be more effective to remind him of how poorly I had been treated in my father’s home? Would that awaken his sympathy? Or would it cause him to think I had less value?
“Celia.” His voice was amused, warm, and slightly exasperated. It was a bizarre tone from someone who had made me sleep in a crypt. “I want to know what’s going on in that brilliant mind of yours. Stop plotting, and tell me what you’re thinking before I take the excuse to pull you over my lap and beat that beautiful ass of yours all over again.”
“Why would you think I’m brilliant?”
His cryptic smile just stretched slightly wider, and I felt an edge of panic. I had no way of warning Kara, Natalie, and Moriah right now anyway, but I was desperate to know what he knew. What our fathers might know.
Even now, in this monster’s house, I was still more afraid of my father.
“I’m happy to eat,” I told him, looking carefully at the pastries to avoid his eyes. Golden croissants glistened with a buttery sheen, plump danishes bursting with vibrant fruit preserves were nestled against cinnamon-dusted buns, and flaky chocolate croissants called my name. I picked up one of the croissants. “And I’d be happy to drink coffee too. Hint hint.”
He raised both eyebrows at that. “If I had just been kidnapped, I’m not sure I would say, hint hint to my kidnapper.”
“Was I kidnapped?” I asked mildly.
I bit into the chocolate croissant. It was even more flaky and delicious than it had looked, the chocolate melting on my tongue.
I’ve never had a foodgasm. This might come the closest. But I also had the feeling that Luca was as keenly aware of my body as I always was of his, and so…
I let my eyes drift shut and I moaned. I ran the tip of my tongue over my lips to capture the lost crumbs of pastry, aware of his focus on my mouth. I opened my eyes and took another bite, and as I ate, I continued to make noise that should have suggested I was actually pastry-sexual.
He rested his hand lightly on the back of my chair. I felt him move—I was always so keenly aware of him—and then I breathed in the scent of his aftershave as he shifted closer.
“You,” he said, his voice teasing and warm, as if he knew what I was doing. His hand drifted to my shoulder, touching me almost affectionately as he got up.
While he moved behind me, I looked over the table. There was a platter of glistening bacon and sausages, another with scrambled eggs, and a crock of butter. Cut melon, kiwis, and strawberries were heaped in a cut-crystal dish.
“Did you make breakfast?”
“What do you think?”
I debated whether or not he wanted my genuine answer.
He set a cup down beside me, leaning over me. He had moved so quickly I had a feeling the cups had already been prepared. “I swear to God, Celia, I will happily spank your ass every time you hesitate to tell me?—”
“I don’t think you made breakfast,” I cut him off. I could try being honest in such a small thing and see how he reacted. “So, I’m curious who else is in the house with us.”
“You don’t need to think about anyone but me,” he promised. He dropped a kiss in my hair and moved to sit at the table again, taking his own mug with him.
“So whoever else is in the house isn’t going to reveal my location to my father?” I asked tartly. He had made it clear I was in danger and needed to stay with him, so there were logical consequences if I did believe him.
“You can trust them as much as you can trust me.”
I trusted him about as much as a lobster would have trusted the enormous Miele stovetop in that kitchen if it had a pot of boiling water on top. I decided to keep that thought to myself and just sipped my coffee.
It was a vanilla latte, topped with almond milk, extra hot, and dusted with cinnamon. I frowned as I stared down at it.
“Something wrong?” he asked innocently.
Just how much attention you’ve paid to me .
“Nothing,” I said. “What are you drinking?”
His answering smile tugged at the corners of his lips.
“Why are you never answering?”
“Because I want you off-balance,” he said unapologetically.
“You accomplished that pretty well with the crypt. Conclusively, in fact. No need to repeat that trick.”
His smile widened, just as I had hoped. “But I also think you’re adorable.”
“When I’m off balance?”
“Off balance. Scheming. In every shape you take…I think you’re beautiful. Alluring. Almost…” He paused, as if he had been about to reveal something he’d chosen not to. He touched my face, his thumb skimming over my cheek, then wiping harder as if he were removing a smudge. “Even decorated in my blood.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
He scoffed. “No, you’re not. Let’s not lie to each other.”
I decided to focus on my pastry. There was no hiding the amusement he felt in response.
I rubbed my free hand over my bare arm, trying to soothe goosebumps that rose across my skin. His gaze fell to my arm, his gaze sharpening. He dragged the back of his hand across my skin, studying me.
Then he half-rose to shrug off his suit jacket. As he started to settle it around my shoulders, I raised my hand to stop him. “I’m filthy.”
“You are. You’re also mine, and I intend to take good care of you.”
I could not read him. But I let him drape the jacket over my shoulders, and I restrained myself from pointing out that I had not felt particularly cared for after he imprisoned me in the crypt.
But he must have known, because he said, “Not that you’ll always enjoy my care, if you’re going to be mischievous.”
If almost beating him to death with a shovel was mischievous , I wondered what he would consider unforgivable.
“I’d say you were gallant, giving me your jacket, if you hadn’t cut my clothes off me last night.” I popped another bite of delicious food in my mouth, certain now that he wasn’t going to hurt me for talking back.
In fact, he smiled at me as if he found me amusing…even clever. He looked at me as if he were delighted every time his gaze found me, and I didn’t know what to make of that look.
No one had ever looked at me like that before.
“I might keep you naked.” His hand reached out and caressed my bare thigh, naked under his jacket. His touch sent a skitter of sparks across my skin.
He was a psychopath, I reminded myself. I’d watched him blow the heads off two men for being inconvenient. He’d proven his willingness to terrify me, and he’d even enjoyed it.
I should not be turned on when he touched me.
“Then you’re going to have to turn up the heat.”
His smile widened. “How did you come out of that house so…fearless?”
“Fearless? Or stupid?”
His smile died. “Fearless.”
I frowned, not knowing why he’d suddenly been so irritated.
“Don’t insult yourself, Celia.”
I wanted to ask him why, but he abruptly stood, offering me his hand. “I need to report back to your father soon. And that means you’ll need to be caged, mm?”
The image of being locked in the mausoleum again was accompanied by fear curdling in my stomach. I set the pastry down, unable to eat anymore, but asked lightly, “You don’t trust me?”
He let out a laugh, and the tension that had suddenly risen was gone instantly. He touched his fingers to the cut in his forehead. “Let the stitches heal before you ask me that, yeah?”
The smile that came to my lips surprised me.
He was still holding out his hand, and I took it. It wasn’t as if I had any choice anyway.