Chapter 13 – Chrissy #2
This voice was smoother. It was clipped and careful, like cold velvet running along my nerve endings.
I swallowed hard and chewed on my bottom lip for a second before answering.
“Yes,” I said. My voice was so damn small and unsteady. “I — I’m ready.”
“Is your blindfold in place?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“You cannot see the door, the windows, or your own hands?”
The phrasing made my pulse skip. I lifted my palms and wiggled my fingers in the absolute dark.
“No,” I said. “I can’t see anything.”
“Good girl.”
The handle turned and the door opened with a soft, unhurried squeak. I heard it close again a moment later. Then the faint sound of a lock sliding home.
My spine snapped straight.
Heavy, measured footsteps crossed the room — one, two, three, each one sinking into the rug like a countdown. The air changed around me, warmed by another presence. Something expensive and clean threaded through the scents of bergamot and old wood.
I catalogued the mixture, trying anything to keep my nerves in check. Cologne, soap, and cold air from outside still clinging to his clothes.
He didn’t speak at first, nor did he shift or pace. The man didn’t rush, either. He just let the silence stretch, full and thick, like maybe he was watching me and cataloging every breath and every twitch.
My fingers dug into the edge of the mattress.
“This is an interview,” he said at last.
His sophisticated voice wrapped around the words like silk around a blade. Low, smooth, perfectly enunciated, with a hint of distance that made it feel like a king addressing one of his subjects.
“You will answer my questions honestly,” he went on, something insufferably confident and arrogant in his tone. “If you lie, I will know. If you attempt to be clever, I will know. If I decide you are wasting my time, you will be escorted off the property before you can blink.”
My throat worked.
“Do you understand me, little doll?”
Little doll? I fought to suppress a shiver at the absolute ownership and intimacy in that pet name.
“Yes,” I whispered. “I understand.”
He hummed, a quiet sound that might’ve been approval.
“I’m certain you skimmed your contract, Miss Jones,” he said. “Most of you did. But I don’t believe you fully grasp what you agreed to when you clicked ‘accept’ and packed your bags to join me in the Game.”
A fresh wave of heat crawled up my neck, and my cheeks burned.
Of course he knew I’d skimmed the contract. Fuck.
“You consented to remain on the property for the full duration of the Game, barring your elimination of course,” he said.
“Moreover, you agreed to be, in the language my lawyers insisted on, a ‘willing prisoner’. You agreed to submit to any reasonable punishment I deem appropriate when you attempt to bend or break my rules. You also agreed to perform any and all duties reasonably expected of a wife, whenever I see fit that you do so.”
My heart hammered against my rib cage so damn hard it hurt.
I remembered the language now. The legalese. The little voice in my head that had whispered this is insane, this is insane, this is insane while my gaze skimmed the contract that had been delivered to my email inbox after I’d clicked accept.
I just nodded, not sure what he expected of me.
“All of this,” he said, “you agreed to of your own free will. No one forced you to sign. No one forced you to come here.”
“I know,” I said. My voice came out hoarse. “I’m not saying — I’m not trying to back out.”
“Good,” he murmured. “I dislike cowardice. It is one of many traits I despise, as a matter of fact.”
He took a step closer. I felt it more than heard it, the way the heat of his body brushed the front of mine without quite touching me.
“Tonight,” he said, “I am interested in three things.”
Suddenly, I felt a whisper of air before his knuckles grazed my chin, tipping my face a fraction higher. The touch was light and controlled, like he was handling something breakable that he could easily choose to destroy at any moment.
“First,” he said, “I want to know why you’re here.”
“For the prize money, obviously,” I said, because that was the obvious answer, the one everyone probably gave.
He huffed once, amused.
“Everyone wants the money, Miss Jones. Be more specific.”
My eyes burned behind the blindfold.
“I need the money for my grandmother,” I choked. “She’s in hospice. Bayview. I’m behind on payments, and they’ve been… kind, but kindness has limits. If I win, she never has to worry about the bills again for the rest of her life, however long or short that may be.”
Silence stretched between us for what felt like an eternity, then he made a soft sound I couldn’t quite read.
“Honesty,” he said at last. “Good girl.”
God almighty, that fucking phrase did things to me I wasn’t prepared to examine. His thumb brushed once over the point of my chin, in a slow, possessive caress, then he withdrew.
“Second,” he said, “I want to know what you’re willing to endure to win.”
My stomach knotted and I pressed my lips together for a moment before squaring my shoulders and answering.
“Whatever the Game requires,” I said. “Within reason.”
He chuckled, a low, cold sound that did unsettling things to my insides.
“Within reason,” he repeated. “I am the one who defines what is ‘within reason’ here, Miss Jones. Not you.”
I bit my lip, hoping it would hide the way it trembled.
“Do you understand?” he pressed.
“Yes.”
“Say it.”
“You’re the one who defines what is within reason,” I whispered.
“Much better, but I’d be more inclined to believe you understand your situation if you referred to me as ‘sir’.”
“Yes… sir,” I whispered, my cheeks burning hotter at the images that word conjured in my mind.
I could feel him pacing in front of me now, the way the air shifted against my skin as he moved slowly from left to right and back again, like an animal testing the end of its leash.
I imagined him there, tall and masked, watching the blindfolded girl on the bed like she was a puzzle he planned to take apart, piece by piece.
“Third,” he said, voice now at my shoulder, “I want to know how you really behave when you think you’ve been left unsupervised.”
My brows pulled together.
“I don’t—”
“Jacob,” he said. Just his name, and nothing more. Everything in me went tense.
“I’m told my groundskeeper decided to… intervene on your behalf today,” he said. “First on the road, then in the foyer. He fixed your tire. He volunteered to be your partner. He put himself at risk to keep you in a game you’d technically already lost. Why?”
Guilt knifed through my heart, sharp and immediate.
“That wasn’t his fault,” I said. “My original partner — Brandon, I’m told his name was — broke the rules. He was eliminated. I would’ve been too if Jacob hadn’t stepped in.”
“Yes,” he said softly. “He spared you the consequences of someone else’s carelessness. How noble of him.”
It didn’t sound like a compliment.
“Please, be fair,” I blurted. “If he’s punished for—”
“Oh, Jacob will pay dearly for volunteering,” he interrupted, utterly unbothered. “No one inserts themselves into my Game without a cost, especially not my staff.”
My hands curled into fists on the bedspread.
“You’re punishing him for helping me,” I said. “That’s—”
“Not up for debate,” he said, voice cutting clean through mine. “The question is whether or not you intend to make it worse for him.”
I sucked in a breath.
“What do you mean?”
He moved again, slow and unhurried, until I felt his presence in front of me once more. A moment later, the mattress dipped on either side of my knees, just enough to tell me that he’d braced his hands there to cage me in.
God, he was close, too close.
“This is an interview,” he reminded me. “And a test. You broke one rule already, by fraternizing with my staff. You were late. You drew attention at dinner. You put yourself on very thin ice. After the way you lingered together outside your door when he escorted you back here after dinner, I’m left to wonder if more happened that I am not, as yet, aware of. ”
He paused and I bit the inside of my cheek hard to keep from whimpering.
“Tell me,” he said. “Has Jacob touched you in any way that would violate the rules of my little Game?”
My heart stopped dead in my chest.
Images flashed behind the blindfold, my hand on Jacob’s arm when I begged him not to leave me alone yet, the way he’d crowded me back against the wall and lowered his mouth to mine when I’d begged for just one kiss.
The sound he’d made when I’d dragged my fingers through his hair.
The way my body had leaned into his like it had been waiting four long years to do it.
The rules echoed in my mind again. I had definitely violated the no kissing rule.
My throat burned.
If I told the truth, it would be game over for me, and whatever ‘cost’ Jacob was already facing would get so much worse. But if I risked lying, and Mr. Stonewood really could tell, I would be eliminated, and Jacob would lose his job. There were no good options.
Seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Bayview Hospice. Balance due.
“Miss Jones,” he said softly. “I’m waiting.”