Page 55 of Kept

It’s notright.

I want to see her lose control. I want to see her scream, see her skin leech of color as terror steals the breath from her lungs.

Even at the apartment, she showed no fear.

How the fuck is she going to survive when she can’t recognise a predator even if he’s staring her in the face?

My hand wraps around the top of her arm. She finally jerks, her body twitching as she tries to pull away from me.

My lips curl into an amused smile. It’s cute.

Like a kitten pulling away from a tiger.

Lifting her is easy, and her hands bat at me ineffectively as I pull her across the room. “What are you doing?”

She tries to hold her ground, pushing her feet into the floor, but there’s no grip to be found.

“I’ve decided this is what we’re doing today.” My grin is still lingering as I push her onto the table and she scoots back, her bare feet sliding up the metal. Rolling my eyes, I grip her ankles and tug her forward. She slides down with a shocked cry, but I’m already winding the leather around her lower legs, entangling her as I pull it tightly. Her legs jerk, parting for me like the fucking red sea, toes twitching like she’s dangling from a damn rope as she tries to pull them free.

I pinch one, just to see what she does, and she curls them in like I’m about to cut one off.

“I don’t understand.” Her voice is raised now as I place my hand directly into her chest and push her down firmly, until her back is flat against the metal. Her heart thunders under my palm as I push up her arm, getting the straps in place and doing the same to the other. Her head whips from side to side as she watches me, and I breathe in deeply. I’m expecting the familiar tangy, slightly sour scent of fear, a mix of sweat and heavy breathing, but all I can scent is her. She smells like fucking flowers, like the forest.

Leaning back, I watch her. Her breathing has quickened, pushing up her breasts in a regular rise and fall. The white cotton is stretched, showing me a hint of peaked brown nipples shadowed against the cloth every time she breathes in. her face framed in white-gold wisps of hair that have escaped from her braid.

She looks like prey.

She looks like a goddess.

She looks likemine.

21 - Zella

I can barely breathe as Enzo moves out of sight. I feel fingers tugging at the edge of my braid, the strands unraveling into his hands as he untangles them inch by inch.

The fire in my stomach that began in Maverick’s arms earlier feels like a blazing inferno now, my stomach clenching and twisting with something that draws the air from my lungs, my forehead damp with sweat as I strain to look behind me and see what Enzo is doing.

But the restraints are too firm, my wrists and ankles locked into place. The faded dark leather doesn’t give an inch when I tug on it.

My nerves are on a knife edge, every single part of me aware of the man behind me, his hands buried in my hair as he gently releases the braid. His fingers dig into my skull, rubbing at my scalp, and my eyes slide closed at the sensation.

“So prim and proper,” he murmurs. My eyelids flutter open, and my lips part on a gasp when his eyes appear. His face is barely an inch away, his mouth close to mine.

“Breathe, little prey,” he coaxes, and I suck precious air into my lungs.

“Good,” he murmurs. “Don’t want you passing out and missing the show.”

My tongue darts out, and I wet my lips nervously. “What show? What are you doing?”

Instead of answering, he reaches behind and pulls my hair forward in two sections, each one passing over my shoulder and down until it’s on display alongside me, the ends reaching beyond the edge of the table past my ankles. Enzo hums as he smooths it out, stepping back to view his work.

“So perfect,” he purrs. But his eyes are dark again as his fingers stroke the skin of my ankle.

“Are you going to hurt me?” I ask.

He turns those black orbs to me. “You chose to run to the monsters, princess. Are you regretting it now?”

He doesn’t understand.

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