Chapter 5 #3
Quick and purposeful.
And they’re heading this way.
I scramble to my feet, still clutching the lamp, my whole body tensed and ready.
The lock clicks.
The door opens.
It’s Leo.
He strides into the room and my heart drops so fast I feel sick.
He’s got blood on his shirt.
It’s not a lot, but enough to be visible against the white fabric.
His dark hair is disheveled and there’s a gun in his right hand, held low but ready.
He’s breathing hard and his eyes are wild, dark and intense in a way that makes him look dangerous, not just theoretically dangerous.
For a moment—just a moment—I’m genuinely afraid.
“Are you hurt?” His voice is urgent and his eyes are scanning me like he’s looking for injuries.
I’m too confused to answer properly. “I—no. The bullets didn’t—they went through the wall but they didn’t hit me.”
He crosses to me in three long strides and suddenly his hands are on me, running over my arms, my shoulders, checking for injuries I’ve already told him I don’t have.
His fingers are rough but not painful, quick and efficient like he’s done this before.
Checking for wounds on someone who might be in shock and not realize they’re hurt.
I duck away from him, stumbling backward until my legs hit the bed, the lamp falling next to me. “Don’t touch me.”
Once I’ve scrambled away from him, my arms feeling like they’re on fire, I finally notice the blood on his shirt and my heart drops into my fucking toes. “You’re—you’re bleeding.” There’s more of it than I thought, a dark stain spreading across his side.
Leo shakes his head, as if being pulled out of his thoughts. “Not mine.” He steps back, seeming to collect himself, and the wild look in his eyes fades back into that cold control I’m more familiar with. “Your father tried to breach the estate. We drove them back.”
No.
No no no.
My chest tightens and I have to blink hard against the tears that suddenly threaten to spill over.
He didn’t win.
My father didn’t win.
I’m not being rescued.
“Is he—” I can’t finish the question, burying my face in my hands. Is my father dead? Did Leo kill him? Is he lying in the gardens with a bullet in his chest?
“Alive.” Leo’s expression hardens back into stone. “For now. He retreated when he realized he couldn’t get through our defenses. But he had help.”
Something in his voice makes me look up sharply.
“Someone gave him the layout of this property,” Leo continues, and there’s a fury in his eyes now. “Someone on my payroll betrayed me and told Connor exactly where the weak points in our security are, how many guards we have, and where they’re positioned.”
He looks at me with something that might be suspicion, and I feel my spine straighten.
“Did you have contact with anyone?” he asks, his voice deceptively calm. “Did you find a way to send a message? Signal someone?”
The accusation in his tone makes anger flare hot in my chest, burning away the fear and disappointment.
“How the fuck do you think I could have done that?” I demand, my voice rising.
“I’ve been locked in this room for three fucking days!
I haven’t spoken to anyone except guards who don’t talk back and you when you came to threaten me into eating!
” I cross my arms across my chest tightly, fury radiating through me.
“Unless you think I have a fucking genie in a bottle somewhere that I’ve been using to communicate with my father? ”
“Someone betrayed me,” Leo says again, ignoring my sarcastic comment. “Someone wanted you rescued and knew where you were and how to get to you.”
“Well, it wasn’t me!” I shout, furious that he’d even suggest this is somehow my fault. “In case you forgot, you kidnapped me! You’ve kept me locked up like a prisoner! I’ve had exactly zero opportunities to contact anyone, let alone orchestrate a rescue attempt!”
We stare at each other for a long moment, tension crackling between us like electricity.
His jaw is clenched and I can see a muscle ticking in his cheek.
He’s furious—maybe more furious than I’ve seen him—and for once it’s not directed at my father.
“I’m going to find out who,” he finally says, his voice quietly lethal. “And when I do, they’re going to wish they’d never been born.”
He turns and walks out without another word, and I hear the lock click behind him with that same horrible finality.
I stand there in the middle of my room and the tears I’ve been holding back finally spill over.
My father tried to rescue me and failed.
Someone on Leo’s team helped him and is probably going to die for it.
And I’m still here.
Still trapped.
Still a prisoner with no idea when or if I’ll ever get out.
I sink down onto the floor and let myself cry, great heaving sobs that make my chest ache and my throat raw.
My father must be apoplectic with rage at the failed rescue attempt and my mother must be devastated.
I cry until there’s nothing left, and I’m so tired I can barely keep my eyes open.
I crawl into bed, pull the covers over my head, and pray that tomorrow will somehow be better than today.
It won’t be.
But I can pretend.