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I shake my head and sit up again. “No, we are entirely different species of human.”
The anger I always have tucked away on a low simmer boils before I can put it in check. “You grew up with money and privilege. In some ways, I did, too, until it was taken from me. I didn’t get money or power again until well into adulthood. Your entire life has been one shining example of what the everyday person should strive for. The perfect life for the perfect daughter. Daddy’s little fucking princess.”
Her anger matches mine, her beautiful face twisted in shock and rage. “You don’t know a goddamn thing about my life. My sister is dead. I don’t know a single thing about my parents, and I’m a twenty-three-year-old virgin who has been locked in her house her whole life. What of that tells you I’ve had a charmed existence?”
I shove off the bed to put some distance between us before I do some damage I can’t repair with gentle touches and ice packs. “Thank you for that.” A low growl escapes my lips. “You proved my point. You want to know why my brother is so mean? He watched his mother die right in front of him. Her throat slit from ear to ear.” Somehow, I strip my own grief from my tone. “And you think being a virgin even compares to that?”
She shakes her head frantically, realizing there is no comparison. “No, of course not. I can’t even imagine the pain he’s suffered.”
The pain I’ve suffered. I don’t remind her of that fact, though. Not when her face softens, and all I see is pity.
I stalk toward the door and grip the handle hard enough to rip it from the door. “Remember one thing, stellina. Everything that happens to you is most definitely revenge. And what your father did means it’s earned a hundred times over. You know nothing about the bastard, but if you did, you’d hate him just as much as we do.”
She hops off the bed and rushes toward me, but I slam the door between us and lock it from the outside before she can reach me. I don’t want to hear her excuses or see the pity she has for me in her eyes. I want her hate, her anger, her fear. I want to taste it on my tongue and swallow it down like air.
Back in my room, all is blessedly quiet. I take a moment to gain control of myself and stalk back and forth, glaring at the door separating us. It would only take a few moments to sweep her in my arms, get her good and dripping wet for me, and divest her of her lamentable virginity. Leaving her ruined for any other man.
It would give me relief but not the satisfaction her father’s crimes demand. No. I need to keep my focus with her. Not allow her sweet words or deep eyes to draw me in.
In a few days, I’ll be wrapping her in a satin bow and sending a thank you note to her father before I drive a knife into his abdomen, gutting him myself.
Only his death will bring me satisfaction and relief. Celia is a means to an end. Nothing more, and to think of her as anything else would be a grave mistake. One I will not make.
13
Celia
Chores keep me busy, but they also give me a lot of time to think. Mostly about home. About the life I lived and how I might have been blind to everything around me. Too consumed by my own wants and needs to notice anything else. To notice my sister hurting so badly, she’d rather kill herself than marry a stranger. To notice my mother drinking more and more every night to dull her pain. To notice my father, so straight-backed and stoic, that he could be hiding the soul of a monster.
I no longer wear the blinders of a child when it comes to my family life. For years, we’d been drifting apart inch by inch. But the accusations Nicolo laid at my father’s feet… I don’t want to believe them. In my time here, I’ve learned enough about my captor to know, at the very least, he believes them. What motive does he have to lie to me? I’m already locked away.
Nicolo must have spoken to Sarah about my chore assignments as she’s taken me off sheet duty, and now I wander the house dusting already immaculate fixtures. Is this a chore or someone’s fantasy playing out? Setting me loose, half-dressed with a duster in my hand. I shake the thought away. I’m just grateful Lucas hasn’t tried to come after me again.
Nicolo’s words keep ringing in my ears. Everything that happens to you is most definitely revenge. If my father is such a heartless bastard and doesn’t care what happens to me, how is my captivity revenge against him? Questions continue to rattle in my head as I drift through the house, being useful to no one.
