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Her voice broke when she said “No one.” Again she'd wanted to lie, but somehow she was sure he would know if she did. And she was too afraid to make him angry. She'd already done so many things to make him angry.
He nodded. “It's late. Try to get some sleep. I'll explain my expectations going forward, tomorrow.”
He had to know she'd never be able to sleep knowing that whatever he planned to do would start the next day. And he had an entire night to fully realize just how easily he would get away with whatever he decided to do with her.
Ari bolted uprightat the sound of Claire's screams. He jumped out of the bed and took the stairs two at a time to get to her. By the time he reached her, she was sitting up in bed, her back pressed against the wall, the blankets pulled up to her chest, crying and shaking.
“Please, Master I'm sorry... please,” she whimpered.
Ari's chest tightened at the fact that instead of begging the monster in her dream, she was begging him. “What are you sorry for?” he asked, betraying nothing in his tone.
“I'm sorry I woke you.”
He shook his head. “It's not your fault you had a nightmare. Scoot away from the wall.” He motioned her and she did as he asked, watching him as if he might attack.
Ari took one of the many pillows, pulled the blankets away, and laid down with his back pressed against the wall.
“Come here,” he said.
She hesitated, but he waited patiently until she moved closer. He pulled her into his arms and held her against his chest, covering her with the blankets. He pressed a kiss against the side of her throat.
“Shhhh, you're okay. He will never find you here,” Ari said, stroking her hair until she finally calmed and settled in his arms. He knew her fear and tension were equal parts the man from her dream and him. He didn't want her to fear him, even after all she'd put him through.
After a while, her breathing evened out into sleep. But Ari couldn't go back to sleep. His mind was too full with everything that had happened.
He could barely believe he had her here. He kept waiting for guilt to rise up, but his conscience remained quiet in the face of everything. The girl in his arms was everything he'd ever wanted, and he'd paid dearly for her. He would have scars on his back for the rest of his life, and she would wear his collar in return. It was a fair trade in his eyes.
He could forgive her, but he could feel no remorse for his own response. She was too broken to ever be free again. She'd always be looking over her shoulder for the man who'd hurt her—a man who was still out there somewhere. Ari couldn't risk that man finding her again to finish what he'd started. And he couldn't stand the thought of her rotting away in some prison cell. He'd seen the guilt in her eyes. It would eat her up inside without the absolution he offered her now.
She would atone. And she would be safe. And if they were both very very lucky, she would eventually be happy in her new situation.
Ari had been so used to the bratty behavior from Holly that he'd barely covered his shock when Claire had obeyed him the first time without the slightest hesitation. Even with as afraid as he knew she was, he'd worried she'd make things difficult.
He'd seen too much of her pain and fear to be unable to forgive her. But that didn't mean he wouldn't demand his own brand of restitution. She would sweetly obey him, and he would reward her with comfort and safety and protection and pleasure.
There were no words to describe how he'd felt when she'd immediately knelt and called him Master. An intoxicating power had coursed through him, and in that moment he knew he wouldn't hold anything she'd done to him in that cell against her because it had made it possible for him to bring them both to this moment.
Absolute ownership. The one thing he'd never been able to take without guilt. Until now. He'd just gotten his first pure hit of the good stuff. And he was addicted.
26
When Claire woke, it took her a few minutes to remember where she was, but when the memory fully reformed in her mind, she sat up in bed, her gaze darting around the room. Ari wasn't in bed with her. He wasn't even in the room. The fire had died, and now everything was quiet. Too quiet. Except the waterfall just beneath her.
She leaned against the wall, staring at the door on the lower level. It was only a matter of time before that door opened. She used this brief reprieve—this small window of solitude—to review everything she knew about this man.
While her situation with him may be new and uncertain,hewasn't new. They had danced the waltz of captor and captive for weeks. Only the roles had been reversed. In that time, he'd mostly seemed calm, stoic. Reasonable.
Except for that first day, most of the time he hadn't acted angry with her. He'd told her over and over he wouldn't hurt her if she let him go.
Claire fought to shut out all the memories of the times she'd beaten him. All the times she'd made him bleed. He could have gotten infected. He could have died in that cell because of her. The memory of the handle of the knife in her hand was still sharp, as if it had left a tactile impression she couldn't rub away.
Behind the fear, she'd felt the hint of relief when he'd gotten the syringe, when the power balance had changed, because no matter what happened she wouldn't have to kill him. She wouldn't have to cut his body into small pieces and get rid of it. No matter what he did to her now, he'd saved her from having to become a killer because she'd found no other path to take but the one that ended in endless blood covering the walls and floor of that cell. It seemed inevitable now that he'd escaped—like the only thing that could have possibly happened.
She remembered the way he'd winced whenever he cleaned the wounds. When he'd wake from the drugs... that wince as the water had touched his skin had been the only evidence he'd shown her that what she'd done was actually hurting him. Even the flow of blood had barely seemed real—like it was just an image without any suffering attached. She'd done her best to detach, to disconnect and impassively watch, to remember what he'd done to her, that he deserved it.
Except now that wasn't true. It had never been true. And she had to live with that reality.
Last night the nightmares had come again, no doubt to punish her for what she'd done. In the dream she'd been in the basement, recaptured. And this time she hadn't gotten away. This time he'd killed her. She'd woken right as he'd been stabbing her, the screams coming out of her half from fear, and half still believing it was really happening in that moment. When Ari had run up the stairs, at first she'd been stuck in the dream, only dimly aware that she was awake and safe... more or less.
