Chapter Twenty-One #2
The coil inside me tightens unbearably, and I feel myself teetering on the brink. “I’m . . . I’m going to . . .” I manage
to get out, but he silences me with a rough kiss over my shoulder, his mouth claiming mine awkwardly from behind, all teeth
and tongue and heat.
“Come for me,” he orders against my lips, his voice a gravelly command that pushes me right over. The orgasm crashes through
me like a wave, my inner walls clenching around him, pulling him deeper as pleasure radiates from my core. I shudder violently,
my knees weakening, but he holds me up, his strong arms wrapping around my waist to keep me from collapsing.
“That’s my pretty girl. Milk my cock.”
He doesn’t stop, riding out my climax with a few more deep thrusts before his own release hits. A low groan escapes him, vibrating
against my back, and I feel him pulse inside me, filling the condom as his body tenses and then relaxes against mine. We’re
both panting, the bathroom air thick with the scent of sex and steam, our reflections blurred in the mirror now.
For a moment, we stay like that, connected, his forehead resting on my shoulder, his breath hot on my skin.
I reach back, threading my fingers through his hair, pulling him closer if that’s even possible.
The doubt from earlier tugs at me—Liam just outside, unknowing .
. . or maybe he knows exactly what’s happening—but right now, in this haze of afterglow, it feels distant, unimportant . . . my past.
Knox pulls out, disposing of the condom quickly before turning me around to face him. He cups my face in his hands, his thumbs
brushing away the remnants of my tears—tears I didn’t even realize I’d shed from the intensity. “You okay?” he asks, his voice
softer now, almost tender.
I nod, my smile still a little dazed. “More than okay.”
He kisses my forehead, a gesture so tender it almost undoes me more than the sex did. Then he hands me the towel from the
floor, and we both take a moment to make ourselves presentable. As presentable as two people can look after fucking in a bathroom
while a third person waited outside.
Knox opens the door first. I follow behind him, my wet hair dripping down my back, my skin still flushed.
Liam is sitting on the couch, a book open in his lap. He doesn’t look up right away. Just lets us stand there for a moment,
marinating in the silence.
Then his eyes lift. They move from Knox to me, taking in my damp hair, my swollen lips, the way Knox’s shirt is buttoned wrong.
He doesn’t say anything. Neither do we.
The fire pops. Somewhere in the cabin, a clock ticks.
Finally, Liam closes his book and sets it on the cushion beside him. “Shower’s free, then?”
I choke on something between a laugh and a groan. Knox tenses, but I catch the ghost of a smirk before he kills it.
“All yours,” I manage.
Liam nods slowly. “Good to know.”
And that’s it. That’s all any of us say about it.
The rest of the day is the strangest strategy session I’ve ever been part of.
We spend the afternoon huddled in the blind spot by the fireplace, talking in low voices with our backs to the cameras.
Whenever one of us needs to get up for water or food or to use the bathroom, we break apart and act normal.
Bored captives killing time. Then we drift back together and pick up where we left off.
The first problem is communication. The cameras in the cabin we can work around, but if we ever get out of here, Marlena’s
people will be between us and anything resembling freedom.
“The cameras have Wi-Fi—that’s how she’s getting the feed.” Liam says it casually, like he’s mentioning the weather. “I pulled
the kitchen board while you two were in the shower. It’s behind the bookshelf.”
Knox and I both stare at him.
“You—when did you even—” I start.
“Figured if Marlena was watching anything, it wasn’t the kitchen ceiling.” He doesn’t look at me. “With that board, I can
rig the Wi-Fi chip to push out a signal. Reach Cole, maybe. Or at least a distress ping.”
“Could you actually do that?” Knox asks.
“Give me a few hours with it tonight and we’ll find out.”
I pull my knees up, resting my chin on them. “What about when the ten days are up? Say we can’t get a message out. Say nobody’s
coming. What then?”
That’s the bigger question. The one none of us wants to sit with.
“She has to move us eventually,” Knox says. “The diamond isn’t here. Whatever happens at the end of this, she needs you to
lead her to it. That means transport. That means a window.”
“A window where we’re outnumbered and she controls the logistics,” Liam says.
Knox looks at both of us. “A window where she expects us to be cooperative. If we play along. Give her what she wants to see.
Hailey agrees to take her to the diamond, but on her terms—all three of us go, or she doesn’t talk. That’s leverage.”
“And then what?” Liam asks.
“And then we use whatever we’ve got.” Knox’s eyes are steady. I can see him thinking about the fire extinguisher, the chemicals under the sink, the knives. “We’re not walking into that blind. We bring what we can hide and we wait for the right moment.”
It’s not a great plan. It’s barely a plan at all. But it’s the skeleton of one, and for the first time since we woke up in
this place, the helplessness loosens its grip just a fraction.
We go quiet after that. There’s only so long you can talk about your own potential death before you need a drink.
By evening, Marlena’s wine collection has become our only reliable source of comfort. We sit by the fire, each of us nursing
a glass of something expensive and red, the silence thick but not entirely uncomfortable. It’s the silence of people who have
too much to say and no idea where to start.
Liam pulls the camera board out from behind the bookshelf. He just sets the board on his knee and turns to Knox.
“I need another pair of hands. You in?”
Knox moves to the floor without a word. They sit close, the board between them, and Liam starts pointing out the components
he’ll need to work with. Their voices drop low out of habit even though we know the cameras don’t have audio.
I stay on the couch with my wine and watch.
Liam’s hands move while he talks, tracing the circuit paths, tapping the Wi-Fi chip with the tip of a butter knife. Knox is
still beside him, taking it in. At one point Liam reaches over to reposition the casing in Knox’s hands, showing him how to
pop it without cracking the housing. His fingers close over Knox’s and stay there. Not long. But long enough.
Knox doesn’t pull away.
I take a sip of wine and pretend I didn’t notice. But I did. And from the way Liam’s eyes cut to me for half a second, he
knows I did too.
They keep going. Liam explaining, Knox asking questions that catch Liam off guard. I can see it each time—the half-second where Liam has to rethink whatever assumption he’d made about the man sitting next to him. He came into this cabin thinking Knox was just muscle. He’s revising.
Knox says something I can’t hear and Liam laughs. Not the performative charm he usually puts on. An actual laugh, startled
out of him. Knox’s mouth curves and he looks away, almost embarrassed, and I feel a pull in my ribs that I wasn’t expecting.
I’ve been so worried about what these two are to me. I haven’t stopped to think about what they might be to each other. They
served together. They haven’t spoken in more than a decade. And yet sitting on that floor with a stolen circuit board between
them, they look like two people who never lost the rhythm. Whatever happened between them—whatever drove them apart and kept
them apart—it left a mark deeper than either of them is letting on.
There’s more . . .
Outside, the storm has finally eased into something softer—snow falling in lazy spirals past the windows, the world beyond
them white and endless.
I drain the last of my wine and set the glass on the side table. “I’m going to bed.”
Both of them look at me. Knox gives me a small nod. Liam’s mouth opens like he wants to say something, then closes again.
“Good night,” Knox says.
“Sleep well, Hails,” Liam adds, his voice softer than I expect.
I don’t trust myself to say anything else, so I just walk to the bed and crawl under the covers, turning to face the wall.
Behind me, I can hear them still by the fire. The soft clink of a wine bottle against glass. The occasional shift of weight
on the couch. And then, after a long moment, the low murmur of voices too quiet to make out.
I close my eyes, hyper-aware of them just across the room, and try to let sleep pull me under.
It doesn’t come easy.