Chapter 3
Bria
I woke up tasting metal and fog. My tongue was thick and heavy like it didn’t belong to me anymore.
The feeling was familiar, but this wasn’t the fall after a high.
Usually there was at least a soft float to it, a warm disconnect where the world felt far away and my body didn’t fully belong to me yet.
This felt different. Heavy. Wrong. Like my brain was trying to claw its way through wet cement.
My eyes fluttered open. My wrists ached. I tried to move them and felt the bite of padded cuffs. My heart slammed against my ribs like a trapped bird throwing itself against iron bars.
Where the fuck was I?
This wasn’t the warehouse. This wasn’t an alley or a dirty hotel room.
I snapped my head around, panic flooding my system. Clean white sheets. Stone walls. A barred window looking out over black water and twisted mangroves swaying under moonlight. Somewhere in the distance, marsh insects chirped.
I almost screamed, but the memory came back all at once—Kael’s bloody hand stroking my cheek, the dead junkie, his calm voice whispering, “You don’t think I’ll kill you,” right before the cloth covered my mouth and everything went dark.
A ragged, terrified whimper slipped out before I could stop it. I jerked against the cuffs, hyperventilating as the chains rattled in the quiet room, my chest heaving so hard it hurt.
The door clicked open.
My whole body locked up. Blood ran ice-cold.
Kael stepped inside carrying a tray like this was some kind of normal morning.
He looked calm. He was always too calm with me.
It was frightening. I had seen him commit unexplainable violence, kill men, cut their bodies into pieces like they were no more than animals.
How could he carry violence around like it was just another part of him, but somehow still manage to smile at me?
Something about that felt worse.
Like death had a soft spot for me.
But in the end, it was still death.
He fucking terrified me.
And the sick part was… before what happened in that warehouse, I’d almost started feeling safe around him.
Kael had helped me before. Fed me. Sat beside me when I shook so hard I thought my bones would crack.
He remembered little things about me—the drinks I liked.
He made sure I ate and even had clean needles.
But I could never fully relax around him. Never fully breathe.
Not when I knew what he really was.
And definitely not now.
Not after waking up cuffed.
He stopped at the foot of the bed. He was wearing a black shirt with the sleeves rolled up, exposing the fresh scratches I’d left on his forearm.
“Good morning, Bunny.”
His voice was low, almost soothing. He set the tray on the small table—oatmeal, sliced fruit, water, and pills that probably weren’t for fun. He pulled the armchair closer and sat down, watching me with those dark eyes that seemed to see every shaky breath I took.
I pressed myself back against the headboard as far as the cuffs would let me. “Let me go. Please, Kael. I didn’t mean—I wasn’t trying to—”
“You were. You were trying to steal from me.” He said it so simply, like it was just weather. No shouting. No rage. Just fact. “I saw you on the cameras. You brought them in. Don’t lie to me, Bria.”
He picked up a tablet from the nightstand, tapped it a few times, and turned the screen toward me. My stomach dropped as the grainy footage played.
Tears burned hot behind my eyes. “They said they just wanted to steal something small. I thought if I helped them once, they’d leave me alone. I didn’t want to give them any reason to turn on me. Darius still has people looking for me and—”
The second his name left my mouth, Kael’s jaw tightened. He set the tablet aside and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. Close enough that I could smell the faint copper and gun oil still clinging to him underneath the fresh soap.
“Darius is exactly why you’re here,” he murmured. “Don’t say his name again.”
I could hear the jealousy in his voice. I knew what men like him and Darius did when they were jealous.
I braced myself, waiting for the monster in him to show— for a slap, for his fist, for him to climb onto the bed, rip the clean shirt off me, and take what men like him always took.
My mind spun with it until I was visibly trembling.
His hand moved toward me.
I jerked backward, the metal chains snapping taut as a shriek tore from my throat. I pressed myself as flat as I could against the headboard, every muscle trembling so hard my teeth chattered.
“Please,” I sobbed, voice cracking. “Kael, please… please don’t hurt me.”
Instead of hurting me, he reached out and brushed a strand of damp hair from my forehead. His touch was feather-light, sickeningly soft against my clammy skin.
“Don’t look at me like that, like you’re scared I’m going to take what you’re not willing to give.
I’m not going to hurt you like that,” he said quietly.
“Never have. Never will. You’re shaking like a leaf in a storm, thinking I brought you here to break you.
But I’m going to help fix you, Little Rabbit. ”
My eyes widened. “What do you mean?”
He moved slowly, pulling the key from his pocket.
He unlocked the cuffs.
I rubbed my wrists, eyes darting toward the heavy door, feeling like a trapped animal. I wondered how far I could get if I ran. Would I even make it to the door? My eyes cut back to him. His face was neutral. He didn’t stop me from sitting up, but he watched me like he was reading my thoughts.
“I talked to your parents last night,” he continued, picking up the bowl of oatmeal and holding out a spoon.
I didn’t take it. He just waited, patient as death.
“Drove by their house before you woke. Told them everything. They’re exhausted, Bria.
Years of you like this have nearly broken them.
They agreed to let me keep you until you’re clean. ”
The words hit like a slap. My own parents gave me to him—was that what he was saying? “They… what? Liar. You’re lying.” He had to be lying.
“I have no reason to lie to you. Your mother cried,” he said softly. “They said yes to me keeping you. I told them they can visit when I allow it. Under my rules.”
The betrayal burned worse than the withdrawal already starting to lick at my edges. I curled my knees to my chest, fresh sobs breaking free. “You’re a monster for going there.”
Kael tilted his head, considering me.
“What is a monster, Bria? They hurt people. They kill. They take what isn’t theirs.
Like you,” he said quietly. “You’re a monster too.
You put your parents through hell for years while they kept loving you anyway.
You let men use you. Let drugs eat pieces off you until there’s barely anything left. ”
I wanted to curse him out, slap him in his mouth, tell him he didn’t know me enough to say those things, but I couldn’t force the words out.
His eyes moved over my face slowly.
He set the bowl down and cupped my face with one hand—so gently it made my skin crawl and warm at the same time. His thumb traced my cheek.
“You don’t have to be. You can beat this. The how is simple, Bunny. You stay in this house. No drugs. No phone. No running. You eat what I give you. You let me help you through the worst. In return, I keep you safe. Fed. Clean. When you’re strong again… we’ll see what this becomes.”
I laughed, forcing the words out. “This is kidnapping,” I snapped, even though my voice shook.
His forehead rested against mine, forcing me to breathe him in. He smelled like sweet coffee, smoke, and something cool. “Your salvation can’t be soft, Little Rabbit. It has to have teeth and bite down, or otherwise you’d run from it.”
He picked the bowl up again and held the spoon to my lips. I hadn’t eaten real food in days. I turned my head.
“Eat the food, Bria.” It was the tone of a parent calling you by your full name, but he didn’t raise his voice or even frown.
I opened my mouth.
When the food was gone, he stood, clapping his hands together like a deranged schoolteacher. “You need a shower.”
He didn’t give me a chance to agree or disagree. He gripped my arm and helped me to the attached bathroom. He waited right outside the door while I showered. I could feel him there the whole time.
I came out in the soft gray sweatpants and oversized shirt he’d left for me.
Kael guided me back to the bed. This time he left the cuffs off. He sat beside me, close enough that our thighs touched. I fought the urge to move away from the contact. Every time he touched me and didn’t hurt me, it confused me more.
“Take these pills before the withdrawal hits.”
I stared at him as he held the pills out. It was crazy that he expected me to just… trust him.
“I’m not taking those,” I whispered, pressing back against the headboard. “I don’t know what they are.”
Kael didn’t get angry. He never did. He just looked at me with patience, like he had all the time in the world to wait for me to stop fighting something that was already done.
“They’re for the nausea and the shakes,” he said calmly. “Nothing that will get you high. Nothing that will hook you on something new. I’m not trying to trade one poison for another, Bunny.”
My hands were shaking so badly I could barely keep them still. The first real wave of withdrawal was crawling under my skin now, like fire ants marching through my veins. Nausea twisted low in my stomach. But I still wouldn’t take them.
I laughed. “You kidnapped me. You killed two people in front of me. And now you want me to trust your words and take mystery pills from your hand like a good little pet?”
His dark eyes didn’t waver. “Yes.”
He set the pills on the tray and picked up the glass of water, holding it out like an offering. When I didn’t move, he sighed softly—the sound almost gentle.
“I could force them down your throat,” he said matter-of-factly. “I could hold your nose, wait until you swallow. But I won’t. Because I need you to choose this, even if you hate me while you do it. And eventually, you will choose.”
The words hit somewhere deep. I hated how scary and reasonable he sounded.
The withdrawal was getting louder now. My legs felt restless, my skin too tight, a cold sweat breaking out along my spine.
I snatched the pills from the tray before I could think better of it and dry-swallowed them, chasing them with the water he offered. It tasted metallic, just like everything else this morning.
Kael watched me the entire time, something unreadable flickering behind his eyes.
“Good girl,” he murmured.
The praise made my stomach flip in a way I didn’t want to examine.
He stood slowly and walked to the barred window, looking out over the mangroves. The moonlight painted his broad shoulders in silver and shadow.
“You’re going to hate me for the next few weeks,” he said quietly, almost to himself. “You’ll scream at me. You’ll beg. You’ll tell me I’m evil. Worse than the drugs.” He turned back to me. “And that’s fine. I can take all of it.”
He crossed the room again and stopped beside the bed, towering over me. For a second I thought he might reach for me, but he only tucked the blanket higher around my waist.
I curled tighter into myself, tears slipping silently down my cheeks.
“Why are you doing this to me?”
“I’m not doing it to you; I’m doing it for you. Don’t you want your life back?”
I didn’t answer. I turned over and closed my eyes, curling my nails into my hands until one pain distracted me from the other.