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I can’t do that. It’s not in my nature. I will fight every moment that I’m here – and if he thinks he can stop me with these threats, he has not met me before.
“So,” Tommy says, with an abrupt change of manner that has me startled. He even smiles. “Are you hungry? Thirsty? What can I have them get for you?”
I blink at him. The change is so sudden that my brain has a hard time keeping up. “What?” I say, stupidly.
“It’s simple, Carina,” Tommy says. The way he says my name this time makes me flush. Carina – sweetheart. He says it like the meaning of the word, not a name. “What do you need right now?”
“My freedom,” I mutter, stubbornly.
Tommy laughs. “That’s the one thing I won’t give to you at this moment. But you can have anything else. Did you eat breakfast this morning? It’s early still.”
“I ate,” I say, warily. What’s this about? Does he mean to confuse me on purpose? Is this a case of the carrot and the stick, both used in equal measure?
“I’m not going to let you starve in here,” Tommy says, knowingly, as if he suspects that I might go on a hunger strike as a protest at being kept away from my home. Well, he’s right, the thought did cross my mind as soon as he brought up food. But I don’t know that I could pull it off. After all, food is one of the great loves of my life. One of the things I most enjoy. Just one look at me will tell you that. “If you won’t have breakfast, then I will at least tell them to bring you lunch in a few hours.”
“So generous,” I say, heavily, so that he knows I’m still angry at being here.
“It’s like I told you,” he says. “I’m very generous. What else do you need? You have the bed, are you warm enough? Too warm?”
It seems as though he’s actually being serious. I glance around, uneasily. I don’t want to sit on the bed it feels too intimate, somehow. “I could do with a chair to sit in.”
“A chair.” Tommy nods encouragingly. “That’s good. We have chairs. I will make sure they bring you one. What else? Go on, don’t be shy. Tell me what you need.”
I sigh. “I need designer clothes and diamond jewelry,” I say, my version of flipping him off. It’s the first fantastical thing that comes to my head. I could just as easily have asked for a Lamborghini, or a new house, or a vacation in a five-star resort, or a million dollars. The point is that his question is ridiculous. I need to go home. All this fake concern for my well-being and comfort means nothing if he keeps me here as a prisoner.
“Alright,” Tommy smiles, with an enigmatic look in his eyes. “I can work with that. I’ll make a few calls.”
I hesitate. He can’t be serious, can he? I wasn’t even being serious, and he ought to have been able to tell that. He must be joking – playing with me. It’s probably easier to pretend to humor me than to argue. I won’t see him again – and I probably won’t even get the chair. This is all just a game to him.
But as I watch, he moves toward the door, drawing his cell phone out of his pocket as he goes. He pauses right before he leaves, looking back at me with a funny kind of expression.
“Don’t go anywhere,” he says, making me want to stomp my foot and scream but he’s already gone, closing the door behind him.
I hear only a few words from the other side of the door before his voice disappears too, gone, down the hall where I’m no longer in earshot. But I’m sure I heard him say something about placing an order. That can’t be right, can it? He’s just pretending – speaking into a phone that isn’t even connected to a call. Playing with me.
There’s no way he was actually serious.
Right?Chapter FiveTommyI make a lot of quick and impromptu decisions, one after the other.
First, that I will give Carina everything she has asked for, everything that she could possibly need. I know her father’s business, he doesn’t make enough to keep her in luxury. She has never experienced it. But I will show her what my power buys, everything she could ever desire. By my side, she could have everything. She needs to know that.
Second, I decide that I will cancel my plans for the night. I was supposed to have an important dinner, a business meeting over food. The kind of thing that often decides the nature of relationships with business owners, with other families, that keeps everything running smoothly. I had already prepared for tonight, I’m ready to present a deal that could help out this businessman very much. But I don’t care about his needs. Tonight, I will see to my own – a chance I rarely take.
