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“Oh, but I will, Elijah. That poor girl lost her parents a few months ago, you held her sister hostage only a month ago, and now you’ve taken her from everything and everyone she knows.”
“That’s why I made her room like the one at the estate, so she would feel at home here.” I brush my thumb across my bottom lip. I’ve never been the best with people, I don’t understand them and I’ve never wanted to before. But I want to understand Snow. It’s what I’ve been trying to do from afar all these years. But there’s only so much you can learn about someone from the shadows. Now it’s time I step out into the light.
Mrs. Chambers’s eyes soften. “I know, dear, but you have to remember this isn’t a choice she’s made, and you have to be patient with her.”
“I’ll make sure she eats something.”
“Good. There’s food on a tray in the dining room for her. It’s everything you told me she likes.”
When you’ve watched someone as long as I’ve watched Snow, you get to know all their favorite foods, scents and little things not even the people closest to them know, and so I made Mrs. Chambers a guide to all things that make up Snow Saint James. I meant it when I said I want her to be happy here. Because this is her home now, and while she’s here, regardless of her feelings about it, her feelings matter to me, even if no one’s ever had before.
Mrs. Chambers leaves the office without another word, and I drop my head into my hands. I don’t have time for this. As much as I want to spend time with my Snowflake and help her settle in, the business is taking up a lot more of my time than I anticipated, and as much as she wants to think the reason she hasn’t seen me is because of our altercation the other morning, the reality is much less exciting. I need to promote someone enough they can take some of this shit off my plate.
I push myself up from my desk and move into the dining room to pick up the tray. True to her word, a decadent selection of French toast and fruit smothered in maple syrup is ready for me to take to her. While she mainly eats fruit and smoothies in the morning, this is her favorite. It’s the treat her mother used to make her when she was sad and what she makes herself when the world gets to be too much.
When I push the door open to her room, I can’t help but stop and stare for a moment. The room smells like her. The perfume she wears, the shampoo she uses, it’s mingled in the very structure of the room after only a few days of her being here, and I’m addicted to the scent. She’s curled up in a ball in the center of the bed, her blonde curls surrounding her. She looks so fucking beautiful as she lets out a little snore, and I find myself gravitating toward her.
I place the tray down quietly on the table beside the bed, making sure not to wake her. Before I consciously make the decision, I kick my shoes off and carefully lay beside her. Close enough that her breath whispers across my cheeks, but far enough that she doesn’t realize I’m here. I wish I could say this is the first time I’ve climbed into bed beside her without her knowing, but that’s far from the case. Every time I broke into her apartment at night, unable to keep myself away from her for another moment, I would do just this. I’d never sleep, not when she could wake up and find me there, but just being close to her calmed a part of me that was always wild. The caged animal could finally breathe.
I should wake her so she can eat something, but she won’t let me this close while her eyes are open. Not yet. Mrs. Chambers was right about one thing, if I don’t make her want to be here, she’s going to run, and while I’ll always bring her back, always bring her home, she’s not going to appreciate being hunted.
All the times I’ve done this in the past, I haven’t wanted her to catch me. Being there wasn’t ever part of the plan, but now she’s here, in my house, at my mercy. It doesn’t matter if she knows I have a proclivity for watching her sleep. She can finally know how truly obsessed I’ve been with her all these years.
I reach out and brush my fingers across her cheek, her skin so soft I barely contain the groan clawing its way up my throat. It makes the baser part of me scream to throw the sheets back and ravage her body, taking what has always been mine, even if she didn’t know it. But I promised her I wouldn’t take her against her will, and I meant it. Unlike most of the men in my family, I don’t enjoy when a woman struggles beneath me or the way she screams at the invasion of her body, and I certainly won’t be doing it to Snow. But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to touch her. She’ll never know what she wants if I don’t show her, and I’m going to show her just how good we can be together.
15
Snow
Ever since I was taken, I’ve known I’m being watched. Every moment of every day, there are eyes on me. Whether I can see them is a whole other story, but I know they’re there, watching my every move.
But as consciousness comes back to me, there’s something different about the way I’m being watched. At first, I keep my eyes closed, not wanting to draw attention to the fact I’m awake, but the moment something touches my cheek, my eyes fly open, and a scream tears from my throat.
Before I’ve fully realized it’s Elijah lying beside me, his green eyes assessing my every move, he rolls me to my back and settles his weight over me, a small smile playing on his lips.
“I like it when you scream for me, Snowflake.” The way my name rolls off his tongue is like a holy man saying a prayer. Reverence and heat in every letter.
“What are you doing?” I whisper as fear grips me around the throat and makes it impossible to drag in a breath.
“A little bird told me you’re not eating.”
“So? What do you care?” I should push him off me, or at the very least make some attempt to get away from him, but I’m frozen in place, like the moment he rolled on top of me, I lost all ability to fight.
Elijah sighs, annoyance flickering across his gaze. Rationally I know I shouldn’t antagonize one of the scariest men in Chicago, perhaps only surpassed by Tommy and his love for blood and death, but I can’t help myself.
“I thought I’d been quite clear with you about all this, Snow. You are here because you’re mine, and I take care of what belongs to me, even if you’re not willing to look after yourself.”
I stare up at him, trying not to allow myself to relax beneath his weight. His warmth is comforting despite him being the reason for my anxiety in the first place. “I’m not hungry.”
I turn my head until my cheek hits the pillow. It’s easier to deal with men like Elijah when you don’t have to look them in the eye. It’s why when I pick a fight with my brothers, I always do it over the phone.
His fingers grip my chin in a harsh hold, and he pries my face back to his. When our eyes clash, there’s heat and anger behind his gaze. “I don’t care if you’re hungry, Snow. I care if you’re healthy. Mrs. Chambers said you barely ate last night, which means if you miss breakfast, you would have missed two meals in a row, and that’s unacceptable.”
I glare up at him. How dare he speak to me like I’m a petulant child? I’m old enough to choose if I want to eat or not. Who the hell does he think he is?
“Mrs. Chambers made your favorite.” He nods toward the table beside my bed, and I follow his gaze, the smell hitting me the moment my eyes fall upon the plate. How did I not notice that before?
My mouth drops open and my head snaps back to look at him. “How the fuck do you know about that?” I hiss, using all my strength to shove his chest, but he barely budges. The only sign I hit him is the slight exhale and grunt he makes at my feeble attempts. He moves so quickly I barely catch the movement as he releases his grip on my chin and bundles my hands in one of his, pinning them above my head and rendering me completely at his mercy.
