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The back door opened, and Alanah allowed us in. I was so relieved to see her, I almost gasped, but simultaneously, I wondered if she hadn’t set us up. There was a deep sorrow in her eyes when she met my gaze, and I realized that my capture was not what she had hoped for.
“Take her for a bath,” Joey instructed the mute housekeeper. “Jesse wants her under lock and key permanently. She’s not to have walking rights.”
“I’m not going to run!” I protested.
“You’ll have to prove yourself,” Joey sighed, shrugging. “You should have just come back on your own, Bianca.”
The urge to slap his face was overwhelming, but I managed to stifle it by clenching my fist and trailing after Alanah instead.
* * *
Now more than ever,I found myself comparing Jesse to Atlas. His décor was tacky. His rooms were much smaller and outdated. The towels were crusty and old.
Even the bath was lukewarm in comparison. Nothing compared to Atlas. My standards were now so high. I had been spoiled.
But even if Atlas had lived in a shack, he would personally fix the cracks in the walls or the floorboards popping up. There was a certain standard that Atlas had for how he and the people around him lived. Jesse couldn’t care less.
I didn’t spend long in the bath. I was too vulnerable naked, and I didn’t believe for a second that Jesse didn’t have cameras all over now that I was back. There were eyes on me everywhere.
I tried to open the bathroom door, but it was locked from the outside. Jesse opened it, and I withdrew, clenching the towel to my nude form.
“Where’s Alanah?” I demanded, my voice quivering.
I didn’t like the look in his eyes.
“It’s just you and me, Bianca,” he leered, pushing the door open wider. “Let’s talk in our room.”
“Ourroom?” I echoed, choking on the word. “No! I’m not sleeping with you!”
“Why not?” Jesse spat back. “You only spread your legs for Atlas?”
I laughed mirthlessly. “You stick your dick in everything that moves, and I’m the whore?” I retaliated. “That’s rich, coming from you, Jesse.”
Jesse’s face darkened, and he advanced on me.
“My partners are picked with precision! I ensure the highest quality of females before I am bound to them!”
“You don’t know your ass from your head!” I shouted, backing away. “Your whole bloodline is tainted, probably by your great-grandfather’s STD!”
Ooh, I was really saying the wrong things, but I didn’t care. His face contorted into knots of anger, and he rushed toward me, his fist raised.
“Go on, hit me, you asshole!” I challenged, jutting my chin out. I could taste my heart, and even though I willed myself to shut up, the words continued to flow from my lips. “That’s all you know how to do, isn’t it? Fight and try to fuck?”
He struck out, but I had foreseen it and ducked away before the blow could land.
“And you’re not very good at either one, from what I can see,” I taunted, dancing around the bathroom.
I shouldn’t have kept going, but my frustration had reached its peak. I couldn’t stop myself.
“I’ll show you how good I am, Bianca Barrett!” he snarled, lunging for me again. “Come here!”
Slipping through the open door, I rushed down the hall, the towel dangling precariously. I had barely managed to orient myself in the house before we’d left, and I took a wrong turn, cornering myself at a dead end.
“Now, where are you going to go?”
“To the Underworld, apparently,” I fired back. “If I have to sleep with you.”
“You’re disgusting,” Jesse rasped, moving to close the distance between us. “But I’ll cure you of that dirty mouth you have.”
