Page 66 of Prey

He did it.

He did exactly what I asked him to do.

I lie there for a long moment, eyes still closed, taking inventory of myself. Sore. Marked. Full of him in the most literal way possible. He didn’t half-ass it. He took me thoroughly and left evidence of every minute of it on my body.

And the woman who asked for that is still in me somewhere. I can feel her under the fog of the sedative. She’s not sorry. She would do it again.

That’s the part I have to live with. Not what he did. What I’d do.

The other part of me, the part that survived my stepfather’s basement, the part that spent three years installing extra locks and tape-strips on every window I ever owned, that part is shaking. Because what damage does a woman have to be carrying to put herself unconscious in a kidnapper’s hands and mean it?

Both of those women are me. I don’t get to be only one of them.

I sit up, taking in my surroundings through the drug-induced fog. This isn’t the same concrete cell. The room is larger, maybe twelve by fifteen feet. Walls painted a soft gray. An actual bed with a frame and decent mattress instead of that institutional cot. A small table. A chair. A bookshelf with actual books.

But the door is steel. Still no handle on this side. Still a prison, it’s just a prettier one.

The lock mechanism clicks, and I scramble backward on the bed, pulling the thin sheet around myself. My heart hammers against my ribs as Nikolai enters, still wearing that bone-white mask. His eyes find mine immediately, and I see satisfaction there. Possession.

I knew he’d move me. He told me he would sedate me for transport before the needle went in. I’m not surprised to wake up somewhere new. I half-expected the same cell again. What I didn’t expect was the bookshelf. The real mattress. The chair. A room that someone furnished for a person they intend to keep for a while.

“Where are we?” My voice comes out hoarse.

“Wisconsin,” he says. He doesn’t move from the doorway. “My compound. Forty-seven miles from the nearest town.”

Forty-seven miles. Far enough that running means a lesson in survival skills. He didn’t just move me—he moved me somewhere the geography is an extra failsafe if I get past the locks.

I take inventory of myself instead of panicking. Sore. Marked. Full of him. All of it I asked for. I hold onto that. It’s the one part of this I chose, and I’m not going to let him see me flinch from my own choice.

“Okay,” I say. “What now?”

He studies me, like my calm surprises him.

“Now I start your conditioning.”

“Conditioning?” I ask.

“Training. Preparation. Breaking you down and building you back up into what you need to be.”

My blood turns to ice. “Are you going to sell me?”

His jaw clenches behind the mask, the first crack in his controlled demeanor. “That remains to be seen.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means you’ll do what you’re told and see where your compliance takes you.”

I laugh because the audacity of this man is breathtaking.

“Let me get this straight.” I sit up, the sheet falling to my waist, too angry to care. “I asked you to take me unconscious. But conditioning? A month of breaking me down? That wasn’t in the deal, Nikolai.”

“I didn’t think you’d agree to it.”

“Of course I wouldn’t agree to it! That’s how consent works—the parts I didn’t say yes to are the parts you don’t get.”

His jaw works behind the mask. “That’s not how this works. Not here.”

I grab the water glass off the nightstand and throw it at his head.