Page 76 of Ravaged
Did it?
“I love you too,” he said, looking out the window. “I mean it.”
I smiled, then reached over and touched his arm. “No lies?”
“No lies.”
It was early in the morning. The sun was peeking up over the tops of the trees. We had the whole day in front of us. I stared at him.
“You’re serious that I’m free?”
“Yes, Teagen. How many times do I have to say it? You’re free. You can go wherever you want. I can drop you off, or I can go with you. It’s up to you to decide.”
“I don’t have to go back to the Dahlia District?”
His stance softened then. Maybe he had forgotten that being under his captivity wasn’t the first time I had been used as a piece of property.
“No,” he said. “The Adlers will be removing their protection from the Dahlia District soon.” Which meant that the Adlers wouldn’t be there to prevent the servers from running away. Which meant that if she wanted, Iris could even leave. Dahlia would have no way to keep us in line anymore.
“Does that mean you’re not going to tie me up anymore?” I asked, a teasing grin on my face.
“You haven’t gotten out of that,” he said, a small smile shimmering on his mouth. “I’ll tie you up whenever I want.”
I could deal with that.
“What about Vegas?” I asked. Dad always liked Vegas. It was the gambling capital of the world, which meant that as a kid, we visited there often. But I knew Ethan wouldn’t be sympathetic to a comment like that. “I’ve heard they’ve got an awesome dungeon for kinksters.”
“Kinksters, huh?” he asked, then he punched in the destination on his phone’s GPS. “I can deal with Vegas.”
I put the harp necklace on, holding it to my chest. I couldn’t stop smiling to myself.
Ethan let me be in charge of the music, and we listened to everything. Rock music. Classical. Country. Opera. Anything and everything that was on the radio and had a melody. Neither of us complained. It was freeing to listen for a while, to let the music speak for us. We were comfortable like that.
After a few hours, we took a break at a rest stop. I raised a finger to ask if he still had my wallet, but then I remembered that I had given all of my cash to Dad right before this whole thing started. But as if reading my mind, Ethan handed me a wad of cash.
“Oh, nice. So I scored a sugar daddy too?” I joked.
“I’ll be honest with you,” he said. “If you stay with me, we’re going to be on the run. So until I can find a decent—”
“And mobile?”
“—job,” he nodded, “We’re going to have to make do with what we’ve got.” He pointed at the vending machine. “It’s not pasta, but it’ll get the job done.”
I sucked in the fresh air, full of pine and wet earth. I gazed at all of the choices. Candies and chocolates and chips and trail mixes. Even cups of ramen. Noodles were pretty close to squash pasta. Okay… Maybe they weren’t, but I was too happy to care.
“Ramen and pretzels?” I asked.
“Sure.”
I put in the bills and once we got the styrofoam cups, we got hot water from the tap next to the machine. It took about three minutes for the noodles to cook. I pointed at the bathroom.
“You need to watch me?” I asked, winking.
Ethan shook his head, a playful smile on his face too. “Not unless you want me to.”
It was weird to go to the bathroom, to be alone, to be in there without any chains attached to me. I was used to being the Adlers’ prisoner, but even before that, Dahlia always knew whenever we left the property, especially the servers, like me, who lived on-site. But the truth, when it came to Ethan, was that he had trusted me for a while. It had taken time, but slowly, he had given me more freedom. No chains connecting me to the bed. No chains on my ankles. No cuffs on my wrists.
I could have run from the rest stop right then. Into the woods near the mountain beside us. I could have run and never looked back. And I know he would have let me go. Because he had rescued me from the Adlers, and that meant that he didn’t have a reason to find me anymore. Not unless it had to do with his heart.
