Page 15 of Taming Dahlia

He threw something at me, and after catching it, I took a second to stare down at it. “You’re going to give me the key? Just like that?”

“That depends. Are you going to be good?” he asked me, and I could hear a hint of amusement in his voice.

I raised my eyes to look at him and gave him the most convincing smile I could manage. “Of course.”

King acknowledged me with a nod before casually slipping his hands back into his pockets. “Then here you go. I’m sure that I don’t have to tell you that you can’t go outside, but you’re free to roam anywhere inside the house.”

There was a nagging feeling at the back of my head that told me that he had given in way too easily. It was like he did it on purpose — like he had planned to do exactly this anyway and was just waiting for me to ask him first.

But I decided not to look the gift horse in the mouth, and as soon as King left, I followed after him.

When I took the first step out of the bedroom, I felt like I could finally breathe easier again. Even though I was still trapped inside the house, at least it was a much larger area compared to the single room I was initially locked up in.

I never thought of myself as someone claustrophobic, but these couple of weeks seriously made me question it.

The hallway was deserted, and when I tried to open a couple of doors, they were all locked. After walking around the housesome more, I eventually stumbled across a door that swung open when I tried the door handle.

I forgot all about how I was supposed to be snooping around, and instead just took a moment to simply revel in what I had found.

This was the library of my dreams.

Enormous wooden shelves lined the walls, reaching from floor to ceiling, filled with books to the brim. I walked in, resting my hand on the back of an armchair as my gaze swept around the library. It even had a fireplace!

Delighted, I walked over to one of the enormous windows and peered outside.

The yard was filled with greenery and in the distance, I could see men with rifles walking by the gates, no doubt guarding this place. While that was unfortunate, it was far from unexpected, even if it made my chances of escaping that much harder.

I pried my eyes away from the window and went back to look at the bookshelves, checking out what kind of books they contained. Noticing one that looked more worn down and slimmer than the rest, I grabbed it. Checking the cover, I was pleasantly surprised to see that it wasThe Little Prince.

My ears perked up when I suddenly heard sounds coming from the hall. I put the book back in its place and followed the noise until it led me to what looked like to be a kitchen.

The rhythmic sound of a knife chopping against the wooden board was coming from a person who had their back turned to me. They seemed to be quite focused on the task, not even noticing my arrival.

From what I could see from their back and the hair that was shaved down close to the scalp, I placed him as the third man who had been with me that night when I got caught.

The last member of the triad.

Even though I was certain that he heard my footsteps behind him, he still didn’t turn around.

“Hello.” I greeted him after a minute of complete silence. “I’m the prisoner you keep in this house.”

The knife continued its steady rhythm.

“King is the one who is keeping you here,” the man finally addressed me, not even bothering to turn around.

I waited for him to say something more, but he remained silent.

Not the chatty type, then. Got it.

“And whom might you be?” I asked.

There was a brief moment where I believed that he would continue to ignore me, but he eventually responded with a simple, “I’m Jack.”

Right. I had already met the king and the ace. It made sense that he would be the jack. They really went hard on the symbolism of being the strongest cards in the Don’s deck, didn’t they?

“Nice to meet you,” I replied, trying not to sound too sarcastic.

My eyes wandered around the kitchen again before I ultimately settled on taking a seat at the table.

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