Page 31 of Fearless

With my hands pressed to the mattress to steady myself, ass peeking out of the dress shirt he made me put on, I brace myself for the inevitable.

“Soon, darlin’,” he growls. “Soon.”

I swing around, my heart hammering in my chest as he disappears behind the closet and up the stairs.

My legs give out. I sit on the side of the bed in my red-tinged dungeon and hug myself.

As my heartbeat slowly returns to normal, I fist my hands and thump them into the mattress beside me.

I don’t know how, but I’m getting myself out of this mess. One way or the other, by the end of the day, I’ll be free.

Now that I’ve had a chance to look around, it’s starting to dawn on me that I can’t just hit my kidnapper over the head and hope to escape. I have no idea where I am—am I even still in Edinburgh?

He mentioned a brother. Is his brother here in the house or somewhere else?

No, making a run for it and hoping for the best is not going to cut it.

I yank down the hem of my too-short pajamas as I climb reluctantly onto the bed. Thank God he doesn’t seem remotely interested in me. That would have made this whole ordeal so much worse.

I snort to myself.

And to think, last night I was silently begging him to take me back to his place and screw me.

My eyes stray to the closet. Then they move around the room again and land on that little wooden door. I’m mildly disappointed when it opens to a tiny room just big enough for the toilet and basin inside.

I walk back to the bed, my gaze sweeping over every detail before fixing on the leather cuffs attached to the bed.

Hang on.

This is all business to Cillian...but what if I can change that? What if I can get him on my side? If I can get him to drop his guard…

The vague outline of a plan begins taking shape in my mind.

Shit. It might just work.

CHAPTER NINE

CILLIAN

There is no GBX music in the club right now, and for once I’m actually disappointed. There’s nothing I would rather do right now than spend every penny I have on drugs and quit my arsehole of a job.

But I can’t do that when Cole’s already halfway there for the both of us.

He’s pacing the floor of the office like a caged lion, the smoke in the air twice as thick as usual since I fell off the wagon. The news is on the TV behind him, the volume way louder than I usually allow it.

I stub the end of my cigarette into the ashtray and swear it’ll be the last one. “You’re absolutely sure she saw all the evidence?”

He stops pacing and turns to face me. “Without a doubt. Sent it to Ford’s own private email address and got the read receipt to prove it.”

I let out a sigh and look up at the TV. Ford has got her contact lenses in tonight, probably so the big glasses she usually sports can’t hide the rattled, hollow look in her eyes as she talks to the news reporter.

“Look at her,” Cole says with a tut. “Someone needs to give her a Grammy. She fucking played us.”

She played us well. By the time I crashed Meisie’s car into the tree—hitting Derek on the way—Ford had already reported the car stolen. I guess my little captive didn’t actually have permission to take her mum’s car out for the night.

Ford is on the news right now telling the whole damn country that masked and armed robbers accosted her and her daughter in their home. Made off with the car keys, cash, and jewelry. My little Meisie is apparently in her bedroom right now, too shaken to leave the house.

We can’t use evidence of her daughter going off the rails on a drug-induced bender to threaten her, if she’s already made it crystal clear to the world that her daughter was at home and the victim of a robbery.

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