Page 25 of Taken By the Convicts
“Talking dirty to me already, doc?”
“I. . . I. . .” Her cheeks turned red.
He’d put her off her game. Good. He tilted his head, ignoring the pain that felt like knives going through his skull. Jayce and Crusher had both left.
“I told Reece I’d be okay with you,” she explained, even as she leaned away from him, her distrust clear. He wanted to feel her fingers glide through his hair. “You’re not in any shape to attack me again. Plus, Reece is right outside the door. If you try, all I have to do is yell.”
Attack her? No, he wanted to caress her, to peel that blanket from her and feel her flesh beneath his, to slide inside her and enjoy her heat.
What the fuck was wrong with him? He was horny. Two fucking years without a female was no excuse for losing his focus. Was she playing him? Touching him here and there to make him want her so he’d forget what she’d done?
“What are you up to?” Ivan said.
She tensed. “I’m trying to survive.”
He grabbed her wrist. “I own you.”
“No one owns me anymore.” She yanked her hand away. “Touch me again and I’ll call Reece in.”
Fuck Crusher. The man wouldn’t be able to stop Ivan once he healed. Ivanwouldhave her.
“You want to survive, doctor? Then you’ll listen to me. I’ll keep you alive.”
“What’s the price?” she asked a bit too fast. He’d found her weakness.
“You concede that I own you.”
“No.”
“I won’t hurt you.”
Her breathing picked up. She was afraid of him.
“I heard you quite clearly,” she said, moving away from the bed. “Make it hurt, you said. You wanted Jayce to rape me. You wanted to see me in pain.”
Ivan tilted his head back and stared at the ceiling. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
She hesitated before she spoke. “I’ve only been on Veenith three weeks and I’ve been hiding in the med-center where it’s safe. Where itwassafe.”
She gave away so much with her expressions, and everything he’d seen in her said she cared about people, which is what left him so fucking confused. She couldn’t possibly be the same person who’d killed his men, left him permanently in pain, but it was her. He’d seen her that day, committed her face and name to memory.
He needed answers.
“You kept Crusher from killing me. Why?”
Fucking pain raced through his body again. The Narkosine had already stopped working. He’d built up a tolerance, or the batch was too old to be effective.
“I can take away the pain,” she said. “I mean, I should be able to. Your symptoms are similar to—”
“Not similar. The same. That was my squad you and your team experimented on. Twenty men,doctor. Twenty good, loyal men died horrible deaths in the med-center by people who were supposed to heal them.”
“That wasn’t you—” She shook her head vehemently. “It couldn’t have been.”
“I remember you quite clearly. You stood there looking down on us, taking notes, ignoring our pleas to end the pain.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “I’m so sorry.”
Her apology stunned him. His rage had given him a clear path to follow for so long. He’d always known if he ever made it off Veenith, he’d hunt her down and exact revenge. Now he wasn’t sure what to do. He couldn’t get past the sadness in her eyes or the fact that she’d been trying to heal him. She wasn’t the callous doctor he remembered.
