Chapter Seventeen
Chloe
I woke up feeling warm and surprisingly comfortable, as if wrapped in a cloud.
The mattress beneath me was soft, and a fluffy blanket covered my body.
The sunlight streamed through the windows, like a sunset at a beach house.
How many hours had I slept? Judging by how my body ached, it had been more than I was used to.
As I tried to keep my eyes open, distant voices reached my ears, too muffled to make out the words. But it was enough to send a wave of realization crashing over me.
This isn’t my apartment.
Not my bed.
Panic struck like a lightning bolt, and suddenly all my senses were on high alert. When did I fall asleep?
Shooting upright, I clung to the towel still wrapped around my body as my eyes darted around the unfamiliar room.
I sighed in relief when I didn’t find anyone there.
A small pile of folded clothes lay neatly on the bed’s edge.
Then my gaze landed on a metal cart near the bed that wasn’t there before.
The sight of the home-cooked food made my stomach growl.
But I grabbed the clothes first, a pair of dark leggings and a man’s oversized crisp shirt, probably borrowed from someone at the last minute. Regardless, I was grateful for them.
I quickly pulled on the leggings, surprised at how perfectly they fit, then slipped into the shirt, a little too see-through considering I wasn’t wearing a bra.
My gaze drifted back to the cart. Bread, eggs, grapes, orange juice.
It looked delicious and I was starving, but I was also afraid of touching the food.
Before I could decide, voices on the other side of the door caught my attention again.
I needed answers more than food right now, so I left the meal untouched, carefully opening the door, glancing left and right down the hallway before walking out.
Heading right, I followed the faint murmur of conversation. The hallway was long and elegant, doors lining either side, all closed except for one at the very end from which the voices were coming from.
I approached quietly, taking a quick peek inside. The room was larger than the one I’d woken up in, decorated in tones of gray and black with a rug in the center and minimal furniture. The windows from floor to ceiling were huge.
Zane sat at the edge of the bed, shirtless, his only clothing a pair of dark jeans low on his hips. His back was to me and even his damn back was a masterpiece, carved in lines connecting all the muscles together.
My eyes roamed over the expanse of it before landing on the figure tattooed into his skin.
The inked wings wrapping around his neck finally made sense.
They belonged to a phoenix, tattooed on his nape.
It stared back at me, and it was imposing, exactly like him.
Standing in front of him was a brunette, her hands moving with a practiced ease around his chest. She was the first to notice me, her eyes locking onto mine and before I could say anything, Zane spoke.
“Come in,” he said, still not turning to look at me. It was as if he could feel my presence.
The woman took a few steps back, and I caught sight of her latex gloves. She looked like a nurse or a doctor, maybe the same one someone had mentioned at the warehouse.
I walked in carefully, studying my surroundings.
“Leave us,” Zane ordered next. The woman snapped her first aid bag shut, then hurried past me like her ass was on fire.
The sound of the door closing made me shudder.
Zane finally stood, turning to face me. My heart thumped. I wished I could say it was fear, but it was something else. It was the first time I’d seen him shirtless, and although his physique was perfectly noticeable through his clothes, it was nothing compared to the exact image of it.
His stomach was sculpted with rock-hard abs, his arms bulging and strong. His chest had to be the best part, broad and solid. All proportional from head to toe, he had a body fit for war, his olive skin only making him more irresistible.
He looked too young, too good-looking, too stupidly perfect to be a crime lord.
“I… I can come back later,” I stuttered as he closed the distance between us, making me forget why I was in his room in the first place.
I turned to leave but his finger reached the waistband of my borrowed leggings, pulling me back with a sudden tug, making me gasp into his naked chest. My legs grew weak. I swallowed hard, fighting the urge to let my eyes wander down to his sculpted body again.
“Talk now. You’re already here.”
His voice was so demanding, it made me angry and hot all at once. His eyes bore into mine, knowing I was slowly coming undone, and they had never looked so blue as in that moment.
Looking away, my gaze landed on the gauze over his shoulder, and I suddenly felt guilty.
I may have been in this fucked-up situation because of him but he’d been shot because of me.
Without thinking, I reached out, placing my hand lightly over the gauze, careful not to hurt him.
Heat spread up my fingers as they made contact with his skin and he didn’t push me away this time.
“I was worried about you,” I confessed, my voice so low, so vulnerable, it barely sounded like my own. “Why do you keep risking your life for me?”
Something flickered in his eyes.
“Risking my life is what I do for a living, Chloe,” he said, as if trying to sound detached but his voice came out as a husky whisper that only made my heart want to melt.
“But I’m nothing to you…”
I tried to understand, to find an explanation for his actions, for his hot and cold temperament that left me so confused.
His forehead furrowed. “What does that matter now? You’re here and alive, aren’t you?”
His tone shifted, like it meant nothing to him. But it meant everything to me.
I tried to ask him more questions but wasn’t sure if the words were making their way out, because he kept staring at me as if he was under a spell, instead of answering anything else. He slowly brought his hand up to brush a strand of hair behind my ear and I felt myself melting into a puddle.
He searched my face in detail, almost as if checking my bruises.
His expression never changed, and his thoughts were a mystery to me but my body was wired, wanting more.
My heart raced as his hand traced the curve of my waist. My nipples hardened against his chest, and I was sure he could feel their firmness, the same way I was feeling his impressive erection forming against me.
I hated that my body reacted to him like this but couldn’t bring myself to tell him to stop either.
I wanted so badly to pull him to me, kissing him, giving in to this torturous attraction and tension that he inflicted upon me. But I couldn’t. I had to remind myself of the kind of man he was, of what he was capable of doing to me.
“What happened last night? What did those men want?” I asked, forcing my voice steady. Trying not to look affected by his touch and the way his lips lingered over mine.
“Funny. I have those exact same questions for you.”
The way he kept insisting I had something to do with it scraped at my nerves. How I kept being treated as a suspect in a situation where I should have been the victim was infuriating. But hasn’t it been that way all my life? No one ever gave me the chance to be anything other than someone to blame.
Looking down, I forced the space between us, and he let me, letting his hands fall to his sides.
“What do you want from me? Why am I here?”
As I pressed, his expression changed. He suddenly looked irritated and, without answering, he turned and walked back to the bed to grab his black shirt.
I felt instantly cold with the distance he drew between us.
“I’ve told you everything I know,” I insisted, quivering, “I don’t know those men, and I don’t know why they attacked me. ”
Zane’s expression didn’t soften as he fastened the buttons.
“Then maybe staying here will revive your memory.”
“Staying here as your prisoner?” I spat, the words bitter on my tongue, remembering all the money he’d paid to bring me here.
“You can either be my prisoner or my guest. It depends on how you decide to behave,” he replied with an infuriating calmness. “But right now, I’m not tying you to a chair, am I? Don’t make me change my mind, and you’ll be fine.”
Now, I found myself wishing his bullet wound had started to sting. The arrogance in his tone made my blood boil. I forced a deep breath, swallowing my anger, trying not to piss him off any further.
“You’re wrong about me, Zane. I’m not your enemy.”
“We’ll talk about this later,” he said, dismissing my words. “I have something else to take care of first.”
“Later when?” I pressed, crossing my arms, probably looking a lot like a petulant child.
“Later, Chloe,” he said, using that assertive and by now familiar tone. He didn’t have to raise his voice to sound hostile.
In a breath, he closed the distance between us again.
“I know you have questions.” He said, his gaze locking onto mine. “I have questions for you too. So, we’ll talk later, sí?”
His Italian accent made everything in me melt, and suddenly, I wasn’t so mad at him anymore. I wanted to fight him, to force him to give me the answers I desperately needed. But something had told me it wasn’t the right moment to pick a fight.
The truth was, he hadn’t chained, beaten, or raped me just to get his way. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t. So maybe I just had to stay on his good side for now, until I could figure out a better plan to get out of this alive.
It had been hours since I’d left Zane’s room and returned to mine.
The waiting was killing me, and I was bored. He’d never told me I had to stay in my room. The door wasn’t locked, and the last time I’d checked, no one had been guarding me.
Zane wasn’t in the mansion. From my bedroom window, I’d watched him leave with two of his men hours ago.
So this could be the perfect opportunity to get a better understanding of my surroundings.
The first time I’d entered the mansion, I hadn’t paid attention to anything.
It was large, certainly, almost intimidating but everything about it was a big blur. But I could explore it now.
Opening the door, I glanced left and right, making sure no one was there before choosing to go left—the same direction in which Clarisse had guided me when I arrived.
The corridors were long and impeccably clean, decorated with towering pillars and delicate artwork.
Every inch exuded wealth and power, from the polished marble floors to the heavy wooden doors.
The stone walls, something from another era.
Taking the double staircase down, I let my hand glide along the cool metal rail, descending until I reached the entryway.
Majestic. That was the only word for it.
The ceiling extended to the second floor, with an iron chandelier hanging from the sculpted ceiling.
A beautiful example of a Tuscan-inspired style you’d find in a magazine.
Nothing like that old, creepy, warehouse. Thank God for that!
It was a mansion built to impress, to intimidate, just like its owner—and yet, it was also poor in many ways.
The more I explored, the more it reminded me of a museum rather than a home. I couldn’t find anything personal anywhere. No belongings out of place, or family pictures decorating the walls like most houses had. There was nothing but luxurious decorations with absolutely no emotional value.
If I’d been looking for something to tell me more about my host, then I found nothing. Or maybe I did find exactly what I I needed... Proof that Zane was, in fact, as cold and detached as he made himself seem.
I kept exploring the ground floor until the sound of a door opening nearby made me freeze.
Heart pounding, I ducked behind a massive vase, peeking out in time to see two men dressed in black stepping into the hallway.
Zane’s men. I was recognizing them now from the way they all dressed alike, moved like soldiers, and carried that same deadly expression.
They exchanged a few words before heading outside.
Maybe it was because of me, but it seemed like he had the house under surveillance 24/7, even when he wasn’t there.
As soon as the door shut behind them, I slipped out, tiptoeing toward the room they’d just left.
I hesitated at the threshold, pressing my ear close against the door, listening for signs of movement before stepping in.
It was an office, one so large it could accommodate an area with four two-seater couches facing each other, with armchairs in between.
I imagined this to be a place where they would sit to talk about business while nursing expensive glasses of whiskey.
If there was anything to uncover in this house, it would be in here.
A large mahogany desk dominated the center of the room, its surface covered with meticulously organized stacks of papers.
I approached cautiously, scanning the documents for anything useful.
But what exactly am I looking for? As much as I tried to read everything, I had no idea what I was looking at.
Invoices, contracts, business agreements, nothing immediately incriminating or screaming leverage. Still, it was clear Zane controlled his business from here, at least in part, and was connected with multiple people.
Next, I tried the desk drawers. Locked. All except one.
My heart pounded in my ears and my hands trembled as I pulled it open. Inside was a mix of papers, paper clips, and expensive pens. I moved them aside carefully, not wanting to bend any pages. Then, at the bottom of the drawer, something caught my eye.
A picture of a middle-aged couple, dressed elegantly.
The man was seated in a red armchair, bore a striking resemblance to Zane with the same sharp features, though his hair was darker.
The woman stood beside him, her hand resting gently on his shoulder.
She was stunning, holding herself like a queen. Zane had her eyes.
It wasn’t just a photograph, it was more similar to a portrait, the kind only people from generational wealth would have taken. I flipped it over, seeing handwritten words:
Love,
Lorenzo & Ciara
Something tightened in my chest, an emotion I couldn’t quite place. But before I could process it, the door burst open, slamming shut behind whoever had entered. Panic surged through me, making my hands quiver and the picture slip from my fingers.
Shit!