Chapter 4
LEILA
The first thing I notice when consciousness creeps back is that I'm not dead.
The second thing is that the bed I’m lying in isn’t mine.
It’s softer than my mattress at home, like lying on a cloud, with sheets so soft the thread count must be astronomical. As I blink my sticky eyes open, my head aching with a pain that feels like I’ve been battered, I see that the room is entirely unfamiliar as well.
It takes a moment for the panic to set in, for my thoughts to catch up.
I see dark wood furnishings and a gleaming wooden floor, an expensive-looking rug stretched out in the center of it, and a door cracked open at the far end to give me a glimpse of a bathroom that looks as big as my bedroom at home.
The curtains are closed, but they’re heavy and made of velvet with antique-looking gold cords hanging from the hooks.
The entire room looks weighty and old-fashioned, like a room in a manor house, like the furnishings belong in a museum.
Fuck, did Neil sell me?
The panic claws up my throat so suddenly that for a moment I can’t breathe.
Everything comes rushing back—the last visit to Flanagan’s, where I begged Neil for more time, the cruel smile on his face as he told me we could work something out.
The rough hands on my arms as two men held me, the prick of a needle in my arm.
The feeling of falling, falling, falling into darkness, while his voice followed me down: Don't fight it, Leila. It'll be easier if you don't fight it.
"Oh God." I sit up so fast my head swims and scramble out of the bed despite the pain, my legs shaking as my feet hit the floor. I vaguely remember the clothes I’d worn to Flanagan’s being taken away and being given a man’s tank top and joggers to put on, but those are gone, too.
I’m wearing a pair of silky sleep shorts and a thin camisole that feels expensive, much more so than anything I’ve ever owned.
But I’m still filthy. I can smell myself, and it’s not good. "Oh God, oh God, oh God."
I bolt for the door, my knees nearly buckling, and let out a cry of frustration when I twist the knob and it doesn’t give.
My nails scratch against the metal as I yank on it, but there’s nothing.
I’ve never been so afraid in my life, not even when I saw that look on Neil’s face, not even when I was taken to the dirty garage where I was kept or transferred into that cage.
That was all terrifying, bone-chillingly frightening, but now I’m alone and in a house I don’t know, with god knows who.
The only thing I can think of is that I was sold while I was asleep, that Neil’s made good on his promise to have me ‘work off my debt’, and that whoever owns this house now also owns me.
Mom. I let out a breathless sob as I slump to the floor.
I don’t know how long I’ve been gone, but she must be terrified.
Who’s taking her to her appointments? Who is helping at the house?
Is Alicia taking care of her while they try to find out what happened to me?
Do the police even care, or am I just another city statistic?
She should be worrying about getting well, not panicking over her missing daughter. I might have set her back, made her illness worse, made it harder to fight off, from the stress. Everything I’ve done to try to help, and now…
A sob rips from my throat, and suddenly I’m crying, tears pouring down my face as my entire body is wracked with it. I press my hands against my face, rocking back and forth, the fear making it hard to think, hard to do anything other than spiral into a pit of despair.
I twist toward the door, hammering my fists against it as I start to scream through my tears.
"Hello? HELLO? Let me out! I need to get out of here!"
Nothing. Just my own voice bouncing back at me, shrieking and desperate, the only sound in the silence.
I push myself up and stumble toward the windows, yanking back the heavy velvet curtains with my wet hands.
A blast of bright sunlight hits me, making me blink rapidly, and when my vision clears, I see…
nothing that helps to tell me where I am.
What looks like acres of snow spread out past my window, covering everything that I can see out to a treeline in the distance.
I’m not in the city any longer, and I’m still somewhere cold, but I don’t know any more than that.
The windows are the old-fashioned kind with multiple panes, and when I press my face to the glass, I can tell that it’s thick. Even if I broke one, the drop would likely kill me.
"Think, Leila," I whisper to myself, backing away from the window. "Think."
But this isn’t my wheelhouse. I’m good with numbers, excellent at managing accounts, but that doesn’t help me when I’m locked in a gorgeous room overlooking what seems to be some kind of estate, in a house belonging to, I assume, a stranger.
I can run the odds on this turning out well for me, but that doesn’t help, because they’re very low.
More memories surface, each one worse than the last. Neil’s hands on my face, on my naked body, as he inspected me.
The way his men looked at me like I was meat at the market.
The doctor he brought in to examine me. The things he said about virgins and men who pay well for girls like me.
His promise that I’d make him a lot of money, that when my debts were all paid off, I’d be released from whoever he sold me to.
His warning that if I didn’t please whoever bought me, things would get much, much worse.
I wrap my arms around myself, trying to stop the shaking. Did they...?
I swallow hard, gently squeezing my thighs together. There’s no pain or soreness, or at least, none specific enough to make me think that I was violated in that way. I think whatever they were planning to do to me hasn’t happened yet.
But that doesn't mean I'm safe.
I search the room more systematically, looking for anything that might help—a phone, another way out, maybe even a weapon.
But whoever put me here was thorough. The dresser drawers are empty, the nightstand is empty, and there’s only an old-fashioned analog clock and a lamp on top of it.
I could break the lamp and use the glass as a weapon, maybe, but that’s a long shot. I’m as likely to cut myself.
The closet is empty. The bookshelf has some assorted titles on it, most of them classics. The bathroom is empty as well. Even the mirror is the kind that won't shatter into sharp pieces if broken. Either this is a guest room that’s never used, or they planned this very carefully.
I'm examining the lock on the door, trying to remember if I learned anything useful about picking locks from the true crime documentaries I used to watch with Mom, when I hear footsteps in the hallway outside. A man’s tread, heavy and moving with purpose.
I back away from the door, looking around frantically for somewhere to hide, something to defend myself with. I look at the lamp and start backing toward it, licking my dry, cracked lips as I try to make a plan.
The lock clicks, and the door swings open.
The man who enters is not Rocco De Luca.
He’s taller, broad-shouldered, and broad-chested, wearing an expensive-looking suit without the jacket or tie.
His button-down shirt is rolled up to the elbows, and I see tattoos inked across his lean, veined forearms. There’s a hard, muscled body underneath those clothes, and I feel my mouth go dry as I take in the rest of him—a chiseled face and sharp jaw dusted with stubble, light brown hair with a hint of wave to it, and bright hazel eyes.
He looks at me keenly, something almost like worry in his expression, and that brings me up short—makes me pause, momentarily, with confusion.
If this is the man who bought me, why the hell is he worried about me?
"You're awake," he says, his voice carrying a trace of an Irish accent—second generation, probably. "Good. We need to talk."
I don't give him the chance.
I bolt backward, grabbing the lamp around the neck and launching myself at him, swinging the end of it toward his head with everything I have. He's faster than he looks—his hand comes up to catch my wrist, stopping the glass inches from his temple.
"Easy," he says, but I'm not listening.
I use my free hand to claw at his face, my nails raking across his cheek and drawing blood.
He swears in what might be Gaelic and grabs my other wrist, but I'm beyond caring about the pain in my joints as he restrains me, the lamp falling to the floor and breaking as he tries to maneuver me toward the bed. That only panics me more.
"Let me go! Let me go!" I'm screaming now, thrashing against his grip, trying to knee him, bite him, anything to get away. "I need to get home! My mother needs me!"
"Stop." His voice is sharp now, commanding. "I'm not going to hurt you."
"Liar!" I spit at him, catching him across the chin. "You're all liars!"
Something changes in his expression—a flicker of what might be surprise, or maybe respect. He's strong enough to subdue me completely, probably could have knocked me unconscious again if he wanted to, but instead, he just holds my wrists and lets me exhaust myself fighting.
Finally, when I'm gasping and shaking from the effort, he speaks again.
"My name is Ronan O'Malley. I pulled you out of Rocco De Luca's warehouse last night." His grip on my wrists loosens slightly, but he doesn't let go. "You were unconscious in a cage, filthy, and clearly drugged. I brought you here because it was the safest place I could think of."
Rocco's warehouse. The fragments of memory sharpen into focus: being dragged from Neil’s garage, other women crying from somewhere else in the house, waking up in darkness that smelled of rust and mildew before I was drugged again.