Chapter 5 Leila #2
"I understand perfectly." There's steel in his voice now, the kind of authority that brooks no argument.
"The men who took you will try to kidnap you again.
The fact that I rescued you has put an even larger target on your back.
Rocco doesn't just want his property now—because that’s what he views you as—he wants to send a message about what happens when someone interferes with his business. "
I stare at him. "So what are you saying? That I'm supposed to just stay here forever? Hide while my mother fights cancer alone?"
"I'm saying that going home will only put her in more danger than she's already in."
The words hit me like a physical blow. "What do you mean, more danger?"
Ronan reaches into his jacket and pulls out a folded piece of paper. "Rocco's men went to her apartment this morning. They left this. I had men following him, so they picked it up after the men left. I assume they were looking for you, now that I know the context of what happened."
I take the note numbly, unfolding it, and my blood runs cold. It’s brief, written in sharply angled block letters, all caps.
WE KNOW WHERE SHE LIVES. WE KNOW WHERE SHE WORKS. WE KNOW WHERE SHE GOES TO CHURCH. TELL THE IRISH WE WANT OUR PROPERTY BACK.
"Property," I whisper. My voice cracks.
Ronan sighs. "That's how he sees you. How he sees all the women he trafficks. Property to be bought and sold and used up."
The rage that hits me is so sudden and fierce that it takes my breath away. Property. Like I'm a thing, a commodity, something to be traded based on my market value as determined by men who see my virginity as a price tag.
"If you'd left me there," I say, my voice trembling, "what would have happened to me?"
Ronan meets my eyes, and I see caution in them. A wariness that surprises me. "You don't want to know."
I clench my teeth. "Tell me."
"Leila—"
"Tell me."
He's quiet for a long moment, seeming to weigh his words. "Rocco has clients with specific tastes. Men who pay premium prices for women who are young, educated, and… inexperienced. They don't just want sex—they want to break something beautiful, to own it completely."
I feel sick, all of the delicious food threatening to come back up as my stomach churns. "And after? After they were done with me?"
"If you survived it? If you didn't fight too hard or cause too much trouble? You’d probably be sold to a brothel in whatever country you ended up in.” He looks tired as he says it.
“If I hadn’t gotten you out of there, Leila, your life as you know it would have been over.
And sooner or later, it would have just been… over.”
The words ring with a finality that makes me sink down in my seat. The situation I got myself in was so much worse than I realized, and I feel an undeserved flash of anger at Ronan for being the hero who got me out.
“So what do I owe you now?” I snap.
His expression doesn’t change. “Nothing, Leila. Except maybe to not make this all more difficult on yourself—or on me—than it needs to be. I got you out because I couldn’t leave you there, knowing what would happen to you.
I brought you here because it was the safest place for you.
Do you see why you can’t go home? Showing up at your mother's apartment would be signing both of your death warrants. "
I know he's right. Intellectually, I understand that he saved my life, that going back would be suicide.
But my heart doesn't care about logic. My heart only knows that my mother is scared and sick and alone, while I'm sitting in a mansion eating gourmet food and trying not to notice how attractive my captor is.
"I hate this," I say quietly.
"I know." There’s something that sounds like sympathy in his voice now, and I hate that I want to reach for it, to hold onto the scrap of comfort. "I hate that I need your help. I hate that I can't take care of my own mother. I hate that I was stupid enough to trust Neil in the first place."
Ronan runs a hand through his hair. "You weren't stupid. You were desperate. There's a difference."
"Is there?" I look at him, and for a moment, I forget to be afraid. "Because from where I'm sitting, they feel pretty much the same."
Something shifts in Ronan's expression, something almost gentle. "Desperation makes you take risks you wouldn't normally take. Stupidity is taking those risks without understanding the consequences. You knew borrowing from a loan shark was dangerous—you just didn't have any other choice."
“But I didn’t understand the consequences. Clearly. Not the real ones.” I look at him helplessly. "And now I've made everything worse. Mom's in danger because of me, I'm trapped here because of me. Rocco is still out there, and—"
"Rocco is still out there because I haven't killed him yet." Ronan looks at me impassively. “That will change.”
The casual way he says it—like discussing the weather or what to have for dessert—sends a chill down my spine.
This is what Ida meant when she talked about what Ronan is underneath everything else.
He's not just wealthy and powerful; he's dangerous.
The kind of man who solves problems with violence and doesn't lose sleep over it.
I let out a shaky breath. "You're planning to kill him?"
That muscle ticks in his jaw again. "Rocco De Luca is a dead man. He just doesn't know it yet."
There's something in his voice, something cold and final, that makes me believe him completely.
Whatever Rocco did to end up in Ronan's crosshairs, it's clear that rescuing me was an unintended distraction. It makes me wonder why he did it. Was it really as altruistic as feeling as if he couldn’t leave me there?
I swallow hard. "What did he do to you?"
Ronan's expression closes off, becoming unreadable. "That's not your concern."
"If I'm stuck in the middle of your war with him, I think it is my concern." I glare at him. “What happened to me was apparently your concern.”
"You're not stuck in the middle of anything. You're under my protection until Rocco is no longer a threat."
Protection. The word should be reassuring, but after everything that’s just happened to me, it sounds more like ownership. Like I've simply traded one captor for another, even if this one comes with better food and nicer accommodations.
"And what if I don't want your protection?"
"Then you're free to walk out that door anytime you want." His voice is calm, reasonable—which somehow makes it more frightening. "Of course, you probably won't make it six blocks before Rocco's men find you. But that's your choice."
The statement feels casually, painfully cruel—offering me freedom while making it clear that freedom equals death. It snaps something inside me. I stand up so quickly that my chair scrapes against the floor, the sound harsh in the elegant dining room.
"I can't do this," I say, backing away from the table. "I can't sit here making polite conversation while my mother is sitting at home, wondering if she's ever going to see me again. I can't pretend that any of this is normal or okay or—"
"Sit down." His voice is flat. “You need to eat. I’ll tell them to bring in the next course.”
"No." The word comes out sharper than I intended, but I don't care. "I'm going upstairs. I need to be alone."
"Leila—"
But I'm already moving toward the door, desperate to get out of this room with its expensive furniture and crystal glasses and the man who behaves as if he owns me, just as surely as if Rocco had sold me to him. As if his rescue means he possesses me now.
A flicker of heat warms my blood at the thought of being possessed by him. I ignore it, and keep going.
I make it maybe three steps before his hand closes around my wrist.
"Let go of me." I try to pull away, but his grip is firm, unrelenting.
"I said sit down. There’s no need to throw a tantrum. We haven’t finished talking, or eating, and it’s rude to—"
"And I said let go of me!"
I spin around to face him, and suddenly we're standing close enough that I can smell his cologne. It’s woodsy and smoky, like tobacco and honey, and I can see the gold flecks in his hazel eyes, can feel the heat radiating from his body.
He's still holding my wrist, but his grip has gentled, become less restraint—more. .. something else.
Something that makes my heart race for reasons that have nothing to do with fear.
“You can’t run from this,” he says quietly. “I can keep you safe.”
"I'm not running from anything." My voice sounds too breathless. "I'm just going upstairs to my room."
"Your room?" His mouth twitches slightly, and I feel my cheeks heat, although I hate myself for responding to him.
"The room you're letting me use," I correct.
We’re too close. His hand is still on my wrist. I can see a faint scar along his jawline, make out all the finer details of his face.
I swallow hard and jerk away from him, my wrist sliding free of his grip. "I'm going upstairs."
Ronan doesn't try to stop me this time, but I can feel his eyes on me as I walk toward the door. When I reach it, I pause and look back at him.
"For what it's worth," I say quietly, "thank you. For saving me. I know I haven't been very grateful."
He doesn’t say anything. He only watches me as I turn, and I can feel his eyes on me as I walk away, fighting the urge to run as I try to navigate my way back through the expansive house.
The house feels different as I make my way back upstairs—less like a prison and more like a maze, full of possibilities I don't want to explore.
Every room I pass seems to contain secrets, and I find myself wondering what kind of man Ronan O'Malley really is, underneath the expensive clothes and careful politeness.
What kind of man has a house like this, with guards and locked doors and the casual ability to make people disappear? What kind of man risks his own safety to rescue women from trafficking warehouses? What kind of man says so easily that he’s going to kill someone—and what did Rocco do?
When I reach the bedroom, I close the door and lean against it, trying to catch my breath. I shouldn’t feel safer in here, but I do at the moment. I’m alone at least, and I can try to gather my thoughts.
I need to get back to my mother. Ronan says I need to stay here, but for how long? Until he kills Rocco? The thought is so foreign that it doesn’t feel trustworthy. I’m trapped in a world I don’t understand, and I desperately want to get back to mine.
I don’t know if I can rely on him. If I can trust him. I’m terrified to find out what happens if I don’t.
I’m also afraid to find out what will happen if I do.