Total pages in book: 41
Estimated words: 37733 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 189(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 37733 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 189(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
"Good. Better," I whisper, pushing food around on my plate. He stopped at a grocery store while I slept and bought supplies. As soon as we got here, he made me lunch. I didn't eat much, but it helped. I feel calmer, less like I might crack apart at the seams at any moment.
"Are you ready to talk?"
I shake my head, wanting to forestall the conversation for as long as possible. I know it's a childish move. Not talking about the situation won't change it. It won't make us any safer or reshape our reality. But this is the first time in almost two years that I haven't been under my uncle's thumb.
If I'm going to be dragged back there or killed or be forced to spend the rest of my life running or whatever the case may be, I want to spend at least one day pretending that I'm not choking on the taste of freedom.
Is that too much to ask?
"No?" Domani asks, one brow raised.
"I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to think about it. For today, I just want to be a normal girl," I say, setting my fork on my plate. "I want to enjoy the fact that I'm not trapped in that house, slowly losing my mind. Can I do that for one day, Domani? Please?"
He doesn't say anything, clearly hesitant to let me deny reality when reality might come crashing down on us at any moment.
"Please?" I plead, willing to beg if that's what it takes. "I know it's stupid. But Cillian has controlled every moment of my life since I was eleven. For ten years, I've been under his rule. Tomorrow, I'll deal with the fact that I'm still not out from underneath him. I'll go back to living in the real world where my life is infinitely complicated, and the only way it gets better is by having the man who kidnapped me kill the man who raised me. But right now, I need five minutes to breathe."
"I didn't kidnap you, Finley."
I narrow my eyes on him. "That's your takeaway from my plea for mercy? That you didn't kidnap me?"
"It seemed relevant." He cracks a smile so I launch a piece of bread at him like a missile. The man has ninja-like reflexes. I miss by a mile, but he snaps his arm out, plucking the bread from midair as it sails past his head. He doesn't even look at it. He just freaking grabs it and sets it beside his plate. His eyes meet mine, his gaze heated. "If you're going to throw shit at me, don't miss, Finley."
"Oops. Slipped," I lie, batting my lashes at him. He doesn't intimidate me. I'm not afraid of him. Maybe I should be. Hell, I know I should be. But I'm not. There are bigger monsters waiting for me in the dark than the one who carried me out of my cage.
He watches me for a long moment, his gaze shooting off sparks. He isn't mad, though. He's turned on. Lust swirls like clouds through his eyes. The only thing keeping him in his chair and off me is his own code of conduct, whatever ethos he ascribes to. Morality isn't a fixed absolute in his world. It's ever-changing. But I think if there is one thing that he stands firm on, it's this: he won't take what I don't offer him of my own free will.
He wants my soul. And he wants me to hand it to me.
God help us both, but the longer I spend with him, the more I think I might do just that. Not because I must but because I can. Because I want to know what he feels like all over me.
If that's wrong, so be it. I'd rather die in his arms than live clinging to the innocence that's never served me. I know what my uncle intends to use it for. If he doesn't kill me outright for running, he'll sell my virginity to the highest bidder. I'm a commodity in his world, a piece to move around the board. That's all I've ever been.
With Domani, though? I see glimmers of a different future, and I ache to reach for it. It's utterly terrifying. It's far too soon. We have too much still ahead of us. And yet, I ache anyway.
Perhaps I am naïve, after all.
"I know you didn't kidnap me," I whisper, handing him the first piece of my soul. "You saved me."
"Don't give me too much credit, mio sole. Even before I saw the rope burn, I intended to leave that house with you." His eyes burn into me. "Call that what you will."
"Temptation."
"That's one word for it," he mutters, his gaze running over me. He's so hard to read. I see the desire in his eyes. See how much he appreciates looking at me. Sometimes, I even get a sense of what he feels in any given moment. But what he's thinking? The stuff below the surface? He keeps both carefully locked away in those hazel depths.