Page 26 of Savage Sin

But I’m not about to take the easy way out and put my sister and her unborn child at risk. Shattered pieces of this man’s soul drift deep in his gaze like chucks of jagged icebergs floating in a sea of pain.

Like seeks like.

The words cross my mind before I lock the doors against my thoughts.

He breaks contact and steps back to the sliding door. He pushes a tattooed hand through his hair and pulls something out of his front pocket. A small flick of light and then the scent of another Red Marlboro fills the room.

I stare at his expression through the glass. So many questions tumble through my mind. I sigh tiredly and wish I could rub at the forming headache between my eyes.

“Why do you care about killing Joaquin when those will kill you before you ever get to him?”

His gaze finds me through the glass and we rock stare at each other. He doesn’t say anything. Just puts that fucking cancer stick to his lips, drags on it. Smoke fills the room and my throat clenches. “Scratch that. You’re going to kill us both,” I condemn without mercy. “Only it’s not going to be a quick death.”

He turns his head. Dark eyes roam over me a moment before he opens the sliding door. Sweet summer air filters in. I breathe in deeply. He turns back to looking out over whatever is beyond the deck outside the sliding door. Trees and more trees from what I can see.

A large part of me wants to goad him into an argument. If I can get him mad, maybe he will cut me loose to strangle me into silence. If that happens, I will have a chance of getting away from him.

You’re as stupid as you sound, a voice cracks off in my head. Yeah, but tied up like this, I have zero chance. Free, I at least have a fifty-fifty chance, right? I mentally measure the bulk of him compared to me again. His hands alone are the size of my face. I lower my odds by twenty percent.

Thirty-seventy and in his favor. But still it’s better than zero.

“You can’t keep me here forever.”

I don’t mean to phrase my plea to be untied in those exact words, but it comes out as a challenge anyway. I need to work on my people skills. Something I can do later. If I ever get out of here.

“You belong to me for as long as I say.”

Another puff of the smoke.

My skin prickles with how he phrases that. “I don’t belong to anyone. Give me the use of my body and a shower. Then we talk.” A small bend of the fact that the second I am free, I’m running. We can talk when I get the cops and they lock his ass up.

His shoulders move with a rough chuckle.

He moves swiftly, crushes his cigarette out in a nearby tray and takes both sides of my face between his hands. “Persephone Castel, you are mine to do with as I wish for as long as I wish.Mycaptive. Be happy I’m keeping you alive. For now.” I see finality in his eyes. Just like that, as if his wordisfinal.

He grabs a bottle of water and holds my head up. “You drink when I say, eat when I say. Shower—”

I pin him with a glare. “—when you say. Yeah, I get it.”

“Do you?”

He presses the bottle to my mouth and I fill my cheeks with the water.

And then spit it in his face.

“Yeah, asshole. You are crystal fucking clear!”

I am met with a frosty glare. Impending doom is on the horizon. Large droplets drip off his stubbled jawline and the tip of his nose. Dark lashes close for a second and then he scrapes a hand down his face. When his eyes open and he lowers his nose to mine, I regret my actions.

I flinch, squeezing my eyes shut against what I know comes next. Knuckles against the face hurt and I don’t want to see them coming. But when they don’t come, I crack my eyes a sliver.

Lips peel back in a wide smile, but there’s nothing humorous about it. If anything, there’s wicked intent written all over his face. Those damn dimples have my attention again, too.

His eyes dart to the nightstand. There’s a collection of water bottles clustered together. He grabs two, pops the tops.

Oh, shit.

I’m drenched from head to toe in seconds.

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